Toxic Toast
by IWantAPetBadger
Summary: Ah, moral ambiguity!  With a universe running low on Time Lords to handle the paradoxes and rifts that creep up, Envy is recruited from the brink of absolute death to help fill the niche as more that just a Homunculus.  WARNING: Contains Envy.
1. Chapter 1: First Choice

Envy stood in the infinite, transparent white nothingness called the Truth. The Homunculus was dead. Dying was not so bad for Envy, aside from the utter humiliation, and the near instantaneous feeling of stupidity from just having killed himself. But crushing the Philosopher's Stone that was the core of its being did not hurt until it was too late. And when it eroded away, nothing hurt.

Envy could tell by feel that it was in its human form, something that was baffling because the Sin died in its parasitic form.

Fullmetal described the Truth before, and Envy had even passed through it once. But such as one does when they feel uncertain about a new place, it took stock of the surroundings. Nothing. Envy walked what could have been ten feet before giving up.

It was more eerie to be in a white void than a black one. In a black void, nothing can be seen, and even if there is nothing to be seen, the dark covers up that emptiness. The world of darkness is something familiar, because _there is always hope._

The white void announces with blatant and brutal honesty that you are alone. It reveals it nothingness and it suffocates the imagination. There is nothing to run to and nothing to run from. You are alone. There is no ground to call "solid" or "slippery;" no temperature to call "hot" or "cold;" not a single object to misidentify from a distance. There is no darkness, and the light has nothing to shine on. _You. Are. Alone._

Envy was unnerved. It was afraid it might forget. _Forget what?_ Everything. The person who was called Envy. That before the nothingness, this person called Envy existed in a thing called "time." That there ever was a "before." That anything ever existed at all.

Then the Truth took form out of its nothingness. It spoke. "Well, my dear Homunculus, here you are. Have you finally realized how wire-brained that little scheme of your father's was?"

The Sin woke up out of its daze. "Sh-shut up," Envy snapped. "It's not over yet."

"So you panicked."

The Homunculus growled. "Like Hell was I going to die from a human."

"Indeed. As I recall, you begged that flame alchemist to spare your life. Then you committed suicide. How strange, ungrateful really."

Envy was breathing hard. "You pile of crap, it's not my fault that everything I really needed was just out of out…of…."

Envy caught, for the briefest second, a glimmer. Turning slowly to face it, it saw two men standing inside a big blue box. "What the…"

"Was just out of the corner of your eye?" The one with a three-piece suit-and-tie and untamed hair finished. "You were right, Paradox, he er…"

"…It," the Homunculus reluctantly supplied.

" 'It?' Nooo, we can't have that- it just doesn't seem right. Not at all kind. Well, there's no rule in any language that says you can't add new vocabulary to it (except for the Dirusae Otconians, but they're an odd lot), so let's see… um, how about '_qed?_'"

" 'Qed?'"

" 'That which was demonstrated," to quote the AIVAS1," he explained (but only sort of). "After all, if a human derived life form is neither male or female, it is _only_ self-demonstrated to be it's own gender," he chattered on. The guy was interesting- and not in the way Envy had usually meant it either- he was as much of a curiosity as he seem genuinely curious. Here was a man who saw an endless space of nothing, and treated it like a novelty.

The other man, however, took to the attention of the Truth.

"Paradox," the Truth said, deadpan. "I don't have to guess what you're here for," it snorted. "Fitting for you, though, to choose the Homunculus Envy."

"What?" Envy said.

"Envy, that's you, and I'm the Doctor, by the way."

"Doctor…" it had an uncanny feeling to it. "And he's…" it pointed to his friend, whose conversation with the Truth was scouring its irritatingly smug smile off its nonexistent face.

"Ah, he's the Paradox, and the TARDIS couldn't have gotten here without him." The Doctor patted the blue box lovingly. "Remarkable girl, she is, but just can't make the jump into an omninondemsional space like this one alone.

"Oh, but bringing us here brings us to why we're here. Now, where is it…."

"Stop it." The Truth sounded like it was ready to burst. Envy jumped at the words. "Envy's mine. It destroyed its core; it doesn't have a choice about anything now."

"Which is where I come in," said the Paradox answered. "Envy never had a choice- ever- because it "

"Qed," the Doctor corrected.

" Uh- I'd prefer 'he.'"

" Qed never realized that- er, he had one." The Paradox had the same look and air as the old Greed. "And as you know- but is so like you deny- _Envy's stone still exists in temporal quantum fluctuations._

"Found it!" The Doctor cried, and hop-skipped over to the Sin, presenting a pocket watch suspended from a happy tomato red ribbon. "We couldn't gather all of your stone that got skittered away in the world of micro-particle hubbub during your life, but enough was located to give you a good start."

"So you have a choice," said the Paradox.

"NO!" The Truth was furious.

"You can either spend a certain non-future of eternity with the Truth, or you can open that watch into a universe of possibility with the Time Lords."

"Don't you dare " the Truth bellowed.

Things clicked together in the Sin's head. "HAH!" Envy's signature grin found itself again. "YOU LIED, TRUTH. _YOU_ LIED." With one hand pointing accusingly at the Truth, the other clicked open the watch.

Golden streams gushed from the device and sought out Envy's body. Without needing direction, the energy changed his body and restored his core. For the first time ever, Envy could have honestly sworn that he saw everything. By the end, the Homunculus felt invigorated and even a little dizzy. Then Envy felt something else.

"_Two_ hearts?"

"Ah, yes: very handy," said the Doctor.

It was at this point that the Truth lost it. It screamed like a demon and launched at the other three with black tendrils.

"Let's go!" The Doctor led the escape to the TARDIS.

Envy laughed in mad ecstasy, and as he ran, he turned and stuck his tongue out far enough to taunt the Truth with his stone. "NYAH-HAH!" And the Sin bolted through the TARDIS's door. The exertion and laughter brought pains to Envy's sides, but it was well worth it. Collapsed on the floor, tears in his eyes, it was a wonderful fit. Envy could feel it in his bones; things were going to be interesting.

1 AVAIS is a character in the book series "The Dragonriders of Pern," created and written by Anne McCaffery. I do not own AVIAS.


	2. Chapter 2: A Worrld all Their Own

**Author's Note: Well hello, dear readers! I plan to keep chapters spaced out like this to give you all something to look forward to! It also gives me a buffer for writer's block. Don't worry: this makes it feel like Aslan returning to Narnia (except not, and my stories probably aren't amazing as a magical talking lion that can eat your head off but won't because it likes you). And you'll probably still be alive the next time it happens. And I can't really punish you if you abandon me because I didn't make my miracles convincing enough for you to keep faith in me…**

**ANYWAY… here's chapter two, and I do not own FMA or Doctor Who, only the characters I made up.**

**Read and Review to let me know you care! And sorry again for the boring world-building!**

**Toxic Toast: Chapter 2: A World All Their Own**

Coming down out of his high, Envy began to take in his surroundings. The walls were a giant honeycomb supported by tree limbs. A central pillar radiated an undulating cyan core. The Doctor and the Paradox danced madcap around its base, making adjustments.

The Homunculus pushed himself into a sitting position, roped his arms around his knees and said, "I just realized I cheated death, evaded the Truth, and skipped fate with two complete strangers and I have no idea where we're headed. And all because I knew that the other option was going to be worse."

"Yeah, I know," the Doctor was giddy. "There's no greater way to do things, don't you think? And, generally, yes, most people recommend going with the better of two options."

"Yeah, but why interfere with my fate? _Why me?_ I'm not what you'd call a star citizen. I mean, if you know anything about me, you got to be nuts."

"Fate? No, you remaining with the Truth had only been a possibility, certainly not a fixed event."

At the same time, the Paradox looked at the Sin, came over and plopped down on the floor. "I guess yeh can't be kept in the dark forever. The short and sweet version is that Homunculi make better transitions into Time Lords than any other sentient being. The Doctor here, he's the last of them, of the true Time Lords at least." Envy tried to relax in the Paradox's presence. All his cockiness, and horniness, radiated off him like sweat off a hog. His muscle shirt, the... Envy hoped he was imagining things. The man didn't have to sit facing him directly like _that_. He was too much like Greed.

"Normally, I'm against it," the Doctor said from the console. "But we're needed. I can't guard the universe against every paradox alone."

"What?" the Homunculus was confused. "And what's a Time Lord? What's with you people?"

"We're from the planet Gallifrae, then there was the Time War waged against the Dalek, and everybody lost. Everybody." The Doctor looked eons older; a great, weary, wondering soul. Then he changed back. "Anyway, a paradox is an inconsistency in reality, which weakens its underlying structure. The Time Lords are an ancient race who developed the means to correct paradoxes before the Reapers did."

Envy then turned to the man beside him. "So if paradoxes are bad, then you would be…a…."

"Homunculus Time Lord, yes." Envy stared for a few seconds, '_weirdo'_, he thought. The Paradox continued. "For the Time Lords, paradoxes are a sin. Much more," he smiled, "than jealousy. It's hard for them to get envious. They just don't think that way.

"And that's one reason I choose you. You're a Time Lord Homunculus now, who's not a Time Lord sin. Funny, huh?"

"Yeah. Real," Envy said deadpan. His eye twitched.

"The second reason is that you got spunk. Potential. You're a little off your rocker now, but with a little apprenticeship, you could be one hell-of-a Time Lord."

His smirk grew wider. "And you'll be redeeming yourself and your family while you're at it."

"I WHAT! Oh fuck! You _ you tricked me!_" His expression was priceless, but it was the only appropriate response there was. Luckily, Envy's cynicism meter was measured in logarithmic scale- he could have an idea of what the reading was. "So, what- am I supposed to be called "the Envy" now?" he said after a short pause.

"No," the Doctor said. "For now, you're just "Envy." A title-name is something a Homunculus Time Lord has to earn. Then you get to choose who you are."

Envy sighed, disappointed. "Fine, whatever- I guess it can't be helped. I think "the Envy" just doesn't have the same ring anyway."

"Oh, your new biochemistry seems to be working great, then. Nice to feel you can do something about your fate, eh? Well, here we are, New Gallifrae."

The TARDIS opened into a pastoral scene, with a massive, sculptural and important looking building some ways off. The day was just past noon, but the sky was a blue-violet and the sun- larger than the Earth's- was orange. Envy noticed between first and second glance that the plant life did not quite bear a resemblance to what grew on his home world.

The Doctor started to say something. Envy turned to face him, but then became aware of the obvious. The blue box appeared far too small to hold what was inside of it. He approached he box, and traced the perimeter of the box with his hand. Four right angles set five feet apart from each other. It all seemed familiar somehow, and if he only had a quieter day, Envy could have identified what it reminded him of.

"I need a lot more things to be explained," the Homunculus said.

"Maybe all you need is a stiff drink," a voice from behind the TARDIS. "And you're right in the middle of the road." It came from a youthful woman who could not be mistaken for Lust. Envy could tell she was a Homunculus. She was lanky, with shoulder length frizzled hair, placid expression, and an overall relaxed look about her; a tank-top, semi-tight jeans and sneakers so worn out that the silver tape that bound them together more or less took over the job of being the shoes themselves.

"Why don't you just go around?"

"Path of least resistance."

"Lazy. How long've you been there?"

She was interrupted the sound of wind in mechanical trees. The TRADIS disappeared then reappeared a few feet off the road. "Sorry, there you go," the Doctor said as he came out of the box.

"Since you arrived," she answered.

"What? Liar. I'd've seen you."

She smirked. "That's my power. If someone's not looking for me specifically, they don't register that I'm there, unless I want them to."

"Who _are_you, then?"

"Idle."

"Huh. M'name's Envy." After a short pause he asked, "Is everyone here a Homunculus? How's it even possible to transmute an entire planet?"

"New Gallifrae was found, it was an uninhabited planet," the Paradox said. "All the right things for life to be here were present; all that was needed was a catalyst."

"Huh," Envy said.

"Then just a few million species of life forms were imported from different planets," continued the Doctor, "and let the rest took care of itself. No alchemy needed." Envy arched his eyebrows, impressed.

"That's what I love about the universe," Idle said. "It just sorts itself out and you just have to go with it. Anyway, this is where I was going." It was a garden not twenty paces away from where she stood. She plucked a faded sunhat with a floppy oversized rim from atop the gate (which had been left open) and tugged it on her head. "See ya later." '_Lazy_,' Envy thought.

As the three continued on down the path towards the huge building in the distance, Envy had to ask, "Really, all of this? No alchemy at all?"

"Alchemy never really got a foothold among the Time Lords; we took a different path," said the Doctor. "A few played around with it, sure, but it all sort of fizzled out."

" 'Played around with it?' If I'm following you, they _transmuted Homunculi_. That's not playing- that's serious research. You've got to be desperate or mad to do that." Envy gave a skeptical look. "Besides, the making of normal people usually starts out by "playing." To make a Homunculus, you've got to _pay_. I do know about these things."

"Well, yes, this is true," the Doctor said. Envy began to wonder just where the man drew the line between good and evil.


	3. Chapter 3: Definition of Insanity

**Author's note: Salutations and may you not get sick over the winter! And do a better job of getting along with your family than our little antihero has done. As you can probably tell, I'm not exactly a Greed fan****, but I forgive anyone who is. Like any normal non-violent person, I like to have a little blood and gore in my stories! This is the last world-building chapter. Sorry, I guess I'm too lazy to try and work it all into the plotline more stealthily. But if you watch the Doctor and can follow FMA, you should be able to handle it!**

**I do not own FMA or Doctor Who, but please read and review!**

**Chapter 3 The Definition of Insanity**

As they walked on, the Doctor filled the new Time Lord in on a few things. He covered the Time War and Dalek (to which the Paradox said, "a Dalek philosopher's stone _makes_ you want to puke your guts out,"), what a TARDIS is exactly ("all attempts to absorb one of them has ended tragically,"), and the Reapers ("don't even think about it").

"You should know," the Paradox said when they reach their final destination inside of the building, the Paradox's central office, "that the Doctor wasn't even in on the plan when we first thought of restoring the Time Lords." He sat back in his swivel chair and thumped his feet on the desk. "It was all between the Leaver and me."

The place was too drab and professional for a smart-ass like the Paradox. '_He's got to have something around, this is too clean,_' Envy glanced around for a hint of anything off.

"If in case you're wondering how I found out about it, well, this is something you're going to find out about," the Doctor said. "I've seen more than enough to know that it could, and is almost guaranteed to go horribly wrong." The Doctor's face was stern; it caused Envy to take a step back. The man was dangerous. Even though he was the last of his kind, even though Time Lord Homunculi was a way to preserve his people, _the Doctor was not blind._

Envy averted his gaze; this was perhaps a first for him. He knew then, that the Doctor could make Hell freeze over with you on an iceberg in a pool of molten lava.

The Paradox cleared his throat. "The Leaver's like you, Envy; she wasn't created as a Time Lord Homunculus. She's from the planet Adrapaxus, and she's the last intelligent thing alive from there.

Originally she's a Kobepas Homunculus, and the Kobepas were dying out. In an attempt to save themselves, they started creating Homunculi. Thousands. It backfired.

Envy snorted. '_Well, duh,' _he thought_._

"The Kobepas figured they could invent their way outta th problem. So what'd they do? They created the Rackileesh, a monster that's supposed to eat Homunculi."

"That's even _less_ of a good idea," Envy said. "Dumbasses got what they deserve."

"Oh, just you wait till you get where he's going on this," said the Doctor. "It's so mad it's brilliant."

The Paradox nodded. "At that level of the alchemic food chain, things get unstable. The Rackileesh diet generalized to anything with residual alchemic energy, and they need about three times as much in biochemical energy to remain stable."

Envy simultaneously whistled low and shuddered. The Paradox began to speak and Envy startled. The Paradox's voice came from behind the new Time Lord, as the one behind the desk simply sat and smiled. Spinning to locate the voice, Envy found an exact copy of the Paradox.

"Twins?"

"No," they said. "He's me."

"One Homunculus, two bodies," said one.

"I literally exist in two places at once," said the other.

"I _am_ the Paradox," they finished.

"I can also do things like this," said the one behind Envy. He clapped his arm around the Sin's shoulder.

Envy found himself looking at himself, and saw what the other self saw, which was himself looking back at himself. It was not like scaring yourself by nearly running into a mirror, because both bodies saw what the one saw as they saw their own perspective*.

"And this."

The Envy behind the desk now stood in the nexus of the building, in front of a spire made of some strange material; something that could not be called metal or crystal. All the while Envy saw both visions.

"But onto other things " the Paradox began.

"Now, as I was saying " he said.

And Envy heard both of what the Paradox was saying. His insides quavered. He wanted to shut it all out and return to the safety of the black void. Shut his eyes, close his ears, pull into himself. "Stop it! Stop it! Quit it! This isn't I'm not Stop it!"

Envy felt himself being pushed into the Doctor's hands, who guided him to a chair. The Homunculus went a little limp, leaning into the Time Lord. "A nice cup of tea should work wonders," the Doctor said. "It's how the British solve everything; all over a nice cup of tea."

"_Nmm. I don't need your..."_ Envy gave up.

After the tea, some lunch and a walk to recover, they resumed.

"The Kobepas were becoming space-going during their decline. The Rackileesh adapted to the conditions of space and began to seek out alchemic hotspots," the Paradox said, as if the episode earlier never occurred.

"Alchemic methods varies from planet to planet, and even within them," the Doctor added. "And being unstable as they are, the Rackileesh adapted to each method as their range spread."

"You mean, like a virus," said Envy.

The Paradox shrugged and nodded. "The Leaver saw this coming and skipped the planet."

"Hence "the Leaver," right?"

"No, actually, she's called the Leaver because she left fate to its own doing," the Doctor said. "To the Kobepas, taking rejecting the position as the ultimate master of one's own fate is a sin. It can be called the Sin of the Unrisen or the Sin of Savagery."

"Why'd she leave if she's so damn complacent?"

The Paradox smiled. "That's where I come in, as the Paradox."

Envy understood. "You're the reason why a plan, identical to the one that failed on Adrapaxus is successful on New Gallifrae."

"Yes."

"And you're the reason the Leaver would "invent" her way out of a problem her planet created."

"Yes."

"And you're why she'd ever agree to it."

"Correct."

"And, because you're _the_ Paradox, you would develop a race that corrects paradoxes."

"Yes."

"You are an inherent instability that creates stability."

"Precisely," the Paradox said.

"Things don't work like that," Envy said.

The other Sin only quirked and eyebrow and smiled. '_Jerk._' Envy thought.

* A simpler but less emotive explanation: existing in two places at once would cause you to see two different scenes at once. Now imagine both your selves facing each other. Too logical and objective for our Envy.


	4. Chapter 4: Settling In

**Author's Note: Well, here I am again, here with the last of the ho-hum chapters. Sorry it's so short, but I suppose that's the way things go sometimes. Read and review, please!**

**Disclaimer: I do not own FMA or Doctor Who.**

**Chapter 4 Settling In **

"Ugh, I'm glad he's got other work to do. I think my brain is full," Envy said upon leaving the building with the Doctor.

"You'll get used to that extra brainspace eventually," the Doctor replied. "It might even get to the point that the only people who can follow you are other Time Lords. It happens on an almost daily basis to me."

"And then you give them this look like it should have been obvious, like you did to me earlier."

"Oh, yes, that will probably end up happening to you too."

"Hmm," said Envy.

The day wore on; it was entering the heat of the day, and Envy wondered how much of his pale skin would be burnt. It would surely add to the tiredness he already felt. They walked in silence for a bit before the Doctor spoke again.

"You are actually quite fortunate, if you've been keeping up with the development of particle science of your time."

"Yeah- why?"

"Well, if you know the equations, and are in on what they're doing, then you're just a within a few years of coming to quantum theory."

"Which is…"

"Very unlike anything you'd be used to. Studying it, trying to come up with explanations on your own will help stretch your smarts. You'll also be developing loads of useful skills in the process."

"Ouch. Not today, please." Envy noted the tall grasses of the valley. If they all lay down in one direction, they would likely make a cushiony place to lay and nap.

"Then you'll have to rectify it with general relativity theory, then you can pick up chaos theory."

"Chaos? I don't need any theorem to prove things are chaotic. Just look at my life," Envy cringed.

"No, no, no, it's not like that at all. It's all sort of… all the wibbley-wobblies in things that sort of sort themselves out."

Envy gave the Doctor a plaintive look, too tired to roll his eyes.

By this time, the two came to the garden where Idle was puttering around. Envy turned into the gateway, slumped against the post, and called, "Idle! You here? I've given it some thought, and I think I'll take you up on the stiff drink."

Scanning the garden, they saw the floppy sunhat waving. "Idle is a good name," the Doctor commented.

"Too lazy to stand up or call, but at least she gives a cap," Envy cringed at his own joke. "Good God, I really _do_ need something if that's the best I can come up with." He shoved himself off his support as they walked (Envy more of trudged) over to the other Homunculus.

"Ohh, Ranarian bell peppers," the Doctor said as they approached. He plucked one sunny orange fruit, apparently ripe, but about the size of a peach pit, and popped it in his mouth. "Here, try one."

"You are one of the few people who can out-perk me, Doctor. Thanks." Envy took a bite as he collapsed into sitting cross-legged. "Mm. Cinnamon-orangey. Did you grow these, Idle?"

"I did no such thing. I only provided what they needed to grow. It was the plant that did the growing."

"Erm… that's what I meant. Yeah."

She smiled while still harvesting another crop. "Thanks."

The "stiff drink" they had after Idle finished had the color of blueberries; despite its somewhat pungent flavor, it did warm the throat rather well and send a shiver down the spine. They were in the middle of a communal dining area that was a part of a ring of apartment-like houses. It was one of four, each pointing to the cardinal directions.

"Hoo, wow, this is a good one; I can count on you for one thing, then." Envy said, leaning heavily on the table, his elbows bearing the load. "What is it?"

"A sort of a brandy from a fruit tree." Idle replied. She leaned back against a post that held up the inside balcony "Actually, the variety used to make it is specifically cultivated for making brandy. Have it any other way and it tastes like shit."

"You really seem to know your stuff about plants."

"Yeah," Idle took a sip from her glass and poked at her meal. "So maybe I don't do the running around sort of stuff that keeps the Time Lords worth having in the universe, but I do some of the small things that keep the big things going. It ain't so bad; I'm not in it for the glory, but I'm still here anyway."

"So you figure you got it good."

"Yep."

"It doesn't take much to meet your needs, does it?"

"Nope. You?"

"Argh, I've never really been that lucky. I get bored easy." Envy sighed and took a swig.

"How 'bout right now?"

"Damn tired. You know where the Doctor is?"

"Probably checking over a few things in the TARDIS. He's probably whom you'll be apprenticed to."

"Yeah? Huh."

The conversation continued on in this meandering sort of way; the dinner was the type to come home to: simple and filling. Conversations of others mulled around them, something that never really happened back in the isolated world of his family. It was good to really be home.


	5. Chapter 5: You Mess with the Family

**Author's Note: Well, it's a new year, but I have no resolutions. Every time I try to think of one, I blank. But you may have noticed if you've been following the story from the beginning, that I've downgraded the rating from M to T. I was thinking it over and thought I was probably overestimating content of future chapters, although if you don't like violence… then you probably won't be reading anything with Envy in it, so it's not really my judgment that the problem is it? Oh read and review, thank you very much and I do not own Doctor Who or FMA.**

**Chapter 5 "You Mess with the Family…"**

Envy was shook out of a restorative sleep with a reverberation that set his taut hammock spin*. In his state, jarred with a filtered din trying to contact the higher brain, Envy sat up and looked about groggily. "Wha…?"

"Don't just lay there, you fool," snarled a heavily built man who burst from the corridor and into the common room where Envy slept. "There's Yuurlnats on the attack!" Envy tried to remember where he was. This frustrated the man, who stormed over with a furrowed brow and bared teeth and hauled the Homunculus to his feet. "Come on!"

The shake woke Envy up completely. "What're the Yuurlnats? Who the hell are you?" He caught a glance of something outside the window; it looked like a large prone figure with a great deal of brains splattered out of its eye sockets and lungs out of its torso. The scene vanished as he was yanked away by the man that woke him up.

"Mostly nitrogen. You're the new one?" he was pulling Envy through the hallways of the communal housing. The man wore a form-fitting leather jacket and jeans, heavy-soled army boots and crew-cut hair.

"Yeah…"

"Shit," the man uttered. "Probably haven't got much souls in your stone to handle a battle, do you?"

"Um, no…?" Envy stuttered.

The man stopped suddenly, swung Envy to the wall and slammed his hands to it by both sides of Envy's head. It was an aggressive move, and Envy couldn't help but flinch. The man let out a hot, forced sigh. "What do you do- what's your power?"

"Shape-shift mainly… Where's the Doctor?" He watched the man's version of a Homunculus tattoo- a double-ended serpent, intertwined and each head devouring the other's half- ripple over the taut muscles and tendons of his neck.

"Doesn't matter to you. You're in no condition to fight." Envy blinked. The man gave another sharp sigh, explaining, "You're new, you don't got a lot of stone left, you don't know what we're dealing with, and I saw by that flinch that you're a poor fighter. You'll just get in the way."

Envy felt a pang of insult. '_Ass,_' he thought, but knew the man was right. He did have a lousy record as of late. He stared back at the man, clench-jawed and purse-lipped. It probably didn't help that Envy never put much effort into to learning how to fight. "So… what, then?" he asked.

Envy was dragged around to the western doors. They took in the scene: oversized hunchbacks in sick green armor were trooping about in the valley and the Homunculi were gathering into tight-knit packs on the slopes. Beyond the enemies, a dense wood grew. Even from their vantage point on the crest of the ridge, they could see one major problem. "Kids! How is that-"

"Doesn't matter. You know what hyenas look like?" Envy nodded. "Good. They're our clan symbol. If one is running around-"

"Viewer! Why're the Yuurlnats here?" A child that looked about ten appeared from behind the door. It had a mop of curly hair and a loose shirt and pants.

"Take a wild guess. And you're not fighting." He turned back to Envy. "No one is going to notice a hyena on the loose. You're going to gather the kids up. Speaker, you're to go with the new it and get the brats to a safe spot." Then without waiting, the Viewer took off to join the amassing Homunculi.

Envy snarled. "Who is he, acting all great like that?"

"Don't worry about what he calls you; I'm an it too," said the Speaker to Envy. "There's lots of us as Homunculi. Besides, a fight's about to break out; it's only better if somebody takes charge of organizing us."

Envy gave the child a sidelong glance, wondering why this brat acted so professional about it. "Yeah, well, don't get killed," Envy replied aloofly before transforming. "Geez. Sure you can keep up?" he asked in hyena-form.

The child almost instinctively placed a hand on Envy's back. "We have to see who's in most danger first." They crept further out into the opening.

"Shit- it looks like the kids running around behind the hoard," Envy said, pointing with his hand-paw to the area between themselves and the mob of Homunculi below them. "Our side looks like they're going for an all-out onslaught. If the aliens remain stable, we could be pushed back."

The Speaker nodded. "And the kids get trampled. Let's go, then." He led Envy down a series of minor paths worn through the prairie, as the two hoped the din of the Homunculi mob and the growth of tall prarie grasses would cover their presence. The Speaker explained to Envy what the Yuurlnats were after.

"Water?" Envy was boggled. "As a fuel source? Alchemically, it makes sense, but to use an entire planet's worth? Could anyone be that stupid?"

"They had a lot to power. When they sucked their planet dry, they started looking for more sources for it. And it's easier to find it on wet planets than scooping up comets. So, they wipe entire planets clean of life to fuel the technology of one they already destroyed."

They crept along in silence for a bit before Envy asked, "So, what makes you the Speaker then?"

"I earned it. It's not easy, if that's what you're thinking. I was one of those Homunculi who was created as a child, that's why I look like a kid." The Speaker huffed. Envy glanced over and rolled his eyes. It was then when Envy glanced at the child, that he noticed that one of its eyes was grey, the other a pale yellow. The Speaker continued. "It's also why I can't fight. I'd get trampled- I didn't need to get reminded of that."

"But you have to have some power."

"Yeah, I do. That shake the building took? That was me. I make powerful sound waves."

Envy snorted, but it came out as a squeak. "You're the one who woke me up."

"Sorry," the Speaker said. "Covet," it said to the first child they came upon- a toddler playing with what looked like a scrap of shed snakeskin. "You shouldn't be here. Take her…"

"Envy. My name's Envy," he said before picking up the babe up by the back of the shirt.

"Come on, we've got others to get," the Speaker said. Envy gave a muffled reply.

The mob let out a war cry and assaulted the invaders just then. Envy couldn't help but look and watch the Homunculi engulf the Yurrlnats like a swarm of piranha. He found it… amusing. He sat alert, dish-shaped ears alert, and chuckled as the child swung and babbled from Envy's grip on her shirt. To get his attention, the Speaker tugged on Envy's long mane. "Come on," he snorted at the larger Homunculus.

Hiding behind Envy, the Speaker took two more children by the hand, and led them into an out-of-the-way root cellar for hiding. When retrieving a child that wandered too close to the battle Envy would sneak as close as possible, then rush in, grab the child in his mouth and sprint away.

* * *

In the middle of one rush, he sensed a body flying over his head, causing him to stumble. He saw that a Yurrlnat was advancing on him, most likely the one who killed the airborne body. Envy hunched his shoulders and growled defensively, baring his teeth. He slowly padded to the side as his haunches twitched in anticipation. The Yurrlnat stepped up the pace and tried to catch the Homunculus, but Envy jumped back with a snarl, circled around and tried to attack the alien's neck from the side. He didn't get in far enough. The Yurrlnat grabbed Envy by the fur on his chest and threw him to the ground with one hand, and brandished a dagger with the other.

What remained of the sky in Envy's vision was blocked as a great force tore the Yurrlnat off balance and whiplashed Envy along. Envy yelped. The Yurrlnat lost his grip on him, as the alien hit the ground, Envy was sent sailing into a tumbling meeting with the ground.

"Hi-nya roll-led!" He heard a high voice cry in front of him. It was the child he was trying to rescue. Envy scrambled to his feet, to see what was happening. The Viewer was wrestling the Yuurlnat, but as the match continued, a giant stingray like creature with a metal exoskeleton appeared where the Viewer stood a second earlier. The ray opened its giant maw and engulfed the Yurrlnat's torso in it. The Yurrlnat let out a scream of alarm and forgot about the Viewer; struggling against the new foe instead. It drove its knife into the ray's forehead and the weapon sank in. The Viewer emerged in seconds from the thrashing metallic demon's fin like the Lockness monster rising from the water. Steel-eyed, the Viewer gripped the dagger in a clenched fist, and wasted no time driving the weapon up into the alien's skull. Blood and brains ruptured from the wound, coating both victim and assailant with a furious spray. The blood spattered Viewer turned to Envy, and advanced with a deadly scowl carved into his face.

Envy backed up and cowered a bit, before noticing the child he was to rescue. He took the child by the back of the shirt, all the while never taking his eyes off the other Homunculus, until he bolted away.

Envy returned, child in tow, tail tucked and glancing over his shoulder every five seconds. The Speaker was aghast at the whole scene. "You should have gotten out of there with the kid as soon as you got to him," he admonished Envy, as they crawled away for another child.

"Yeah, yeah, yeah…" Envy groaned. Like he had a choice about it.

In the next round of gathering the young, a stray Yuurlnat happened upon them, but the Speaker, being "the Ultimate Sound," heard it approach and tipped Envy off.

It should be noted that hyenas have some of the strongest jaws in animal kingdom of Earth, bone-crushing teeth, and powerful haunches. The Yuurlnat's throat crumpled like a peanut shell under Envy's snap. Envy found the eye socket and a place just behind the jaw next, dragging his unfortunate victim to the ground. He let go just as the Speaker brought his interlocked fists to meet the enemy's skull. "Beautiful," Envy sneered.

_It was the last thing it saw: the animal with its muzzle sopping with the metallic blood of its victim; a maniacal smile sparkling in the sunlight, jaws parted in a cackling giggle.__The laughter of the beast was the last thing it heard before the child's crushing blow thundered his head into pieces. The Yurrlnat's life closed with the drawing of a curtain of fluid crimson**. _

They then took to the slope to the left of the battle, that being the next place a retreating side would fall to. There was a boy trying to sneak up on the battle, who looked the same age as the Speaker. His name was Reckless, and he began to start a fight with the Speaker upon their arrival.

"Why don't you go fight if you're fer real, huh Speaker?" the boy puffed out his barreled chest and crossed his arms, attempting to look threatening.

"That would be foolish," the Speaker replied. "A melee is not a place I could do well in."

" 'Cause you're a kid."

The Speaker drew himself up to his full height. "Reckless, now is not the time for this."

"Yeah, but 'cause you're so special…" Reckless pouted.

"Shut up, runt, I've heard enough," Envy said finally. He reared up and toppled the boy, showing a mouthful of sharpened teeth. "Maybe _you _want to be turned into muck, and that's fine by me, but orders are that we've got to collect you brats." He then seized the child in his mouth by the shirt collar and dragged him- none too gently- along. Reckless tried to kick in protest, but one slow growl silenced that.

The third group they evacuated were lead into the dense underbrush of the woods instead- it was something the smaller bodies had an advantage in. By their third trip, the Yuurlnats had broken under the pressure of a race of domestics who would not stay dead. They scattered in a retreat that lead them straight into the area where the Speaker and Envy were working. The hoard of Homunculi, already driving away the invaders, screamed in rage at their enemies' poor choice of direction (that being in the direction where their children were), and redoubled their drive to wipe out the threat.

If a small group of Yurrlnats held together, it was only took a few seconds of coordination for the Homunculi to wipe them out. Yurrlats fleeing alone were hunted down like prey, and if any stood to fight, they only made the Homunculi's job easier. Heaven forbid they get caught in the woodland thicket.

* * *

Homunculi, it was later explained to Envy at the post-battle meal, make poor parents as individuals. To get around that, the entire clan raises the children. The expectation that one's offspring will be safe in the presence of other clansmen is ensured by one's duty to protect everyone else's. Mutual respect, because if an act against Homunculus is not reasonable, the wronged are perfectly willing to be _far less_ reasonable. Then consider a hoard of them.

"No hard feelings from me though," Idle commented during the late lunch they had. "They will become one with the earth, and the garden's going to need more nitrates soon. I never do get around to sending in requests."

"So it's a windfall," Envy said, keeping an eye on the Doctor, who sat beside him, for any reaction. The Doctor bit into an apple. "And-a _sort of_ forgiveness when you think about it. I mean- we will be making them a part of ourselves. We're taking our place in the universe. When you look at it objectively, it's what happens naturally. So it can't be wrong***.

"Wait-" Envy realized something. "You actually fought?"

"No, but as I was putting my tools away, there were a number of Yuurlnats who all had vital organs of some sort in the way of where my things belonged. I never realized that their eyeball fluid could be caustic- now I need some new shears." She had a far-off look in her eyes, her fork hanging limply in her hand. "But at least now I won't be ruining the mulcher- we just got it, you know."

"Hey you, it."

Envy turned to face the Viewer. "My name is Envy."

The Viewer's already stern expression flashed even darker. He snatched up the Homunculus by his top. Couldn't this man ever relax?

"What the fuck Man!" Envy gasped through the Viewer's thumbs pressing into his throat.

"Hey!" "What's this about?" Idle and the Doctor started.

"Envy! Listen you, I told you not to fight! And guess what was found?"

"Wha- "

"A Yuurlnat with its throat ripped out complete with bite marks," the Viewer snarled. Envy tried to pry the Viewer's hands off him, transmuting his hands into raking lion's paws.

"Hey, ease up now," the Doctor said. "Put him down, it was battle."

The Speaker came into the scene and protested himself. The glass he held shattered from his sound waves and a tense grip.

The Viewer glared at the Doctor before letting Envy drop and he stormed away.

"What's his problem? Jerk." Envy asked sorely from the ground, messaging his throat. Recently, Envy had begun to learn about angry people, and had come the conclusion- based on personal observation- that the Viewer was an angry, angry man. He took note of this little finding and tucked it away for future reference.

"Did he learn what your name was? From what I've gathered," the Speaker supplied, "He had a brother named Envy, who he hated immensely."

"Why's that my fault?" Envy drank from the glass Idle offered him after the Doctor gave him a hand up to the bench.

The Speaker shrugged. "It's the idea, I guess. You know how sore feelings can be."

"Well," the Doctor said, "the idea of envy means something different to the Viewer's people than yours. To his, envy means that someone isn't willing to do what it takes to get what they want- a waste of emotion."

"Fucking asshole, I'm not his brother. Where does he think he gets the right to take it out on me? And I bet he's not the one that decided that I was worth recruiting."

"Don't take it personally, he always had an attitude." Idol said through a mouthful of some other planet's equivalent of lettuce. "He may have been worried."

Envy furrowed his brow. "Worried…?"

"You fought when he told you not to?"

"Like I had a choice. It was coming straight at us."

"With not a lot of souls in your stone left?"

"This again? Yes."

"But if it gone badly- killing the recruit, he'd be at fault."

"So he's as concerned about my ass as he is about his. That sounds like a proper Homunculus."

"Actually, there's a theory that Dalek Homunculi would be rather decent chaps," the Doctor said.

Envy stared blankly, very deliberately finished chewing, and swallowed. "That's a joke right?"

The Doctor tilted his head thoughtfully and said, "Well, sort of. Given the Dalek outlook on, well, everything, I'd say that their sins are things like… mercy… benefit of the doubt… tolerance, you know, that sort of thing."

"I still don't want to see it," the Speaker grumbled. "Could make them more… _ugh_." He then changed his expression. "But you need more Phliosopher's stone, right?"

"It seems to be a necessity."

"I'll show you where you can get some more. But you can only take what you need. It goes without saying- to keep the peace."

"Oh, I see," Envy knew of no other way to respond.

* * *

***That previous night the conversation went something like this:**

**Envy: Why's there a hammock in the middle of a flat lounge?**

**Idle: I don'no, it's just sort of there. You can sleep in it.**

**Envy: Uhh… hammocks are outside things; it's not supposed to be in a lounge.**

**Idle: Ask Steve. He brought it in here.**

**Envy: Steve? A Time Lord Homunculus named Steve?**

**Idle: That's what we call him.**

**Envy: What's his real name?**

**Idle: I don'no, I've always known him as Steve.**

**Etcetera.**

****This is what I like to call the Kopi Luwak Phenomenon- when the partially digested crap you shit out is an improvement over what it started out as. Wiki "Kopi Luwak."**

***** _"It's the Cir-cle of Liiiifffe/ and it moves us aalllll…" _It's a little known fact that the Homunculi of New Galifray love that song. A/N: If someone makes an AMV of the Circle of Life featuring the Homunculi, I will love you forever.**


	6. Chapter 6: On the Journey to Anywhere

**Author's Note: My, my! Wasn't that last chapter exciting, boys and girls? We can never know what zany adventure our brave hero will get into next. He could be saving a town full of simple folk from the terrors of some fell beast, or rescuing a damsel in distress from a gang of rouge cyborg space-pirates. And all the while, he's learning the wisdom of his fearsome mentor. ****(Cough) At some point in there, I've probably booked my seat to Hell. Again. I do not own Doctor Who or FMA. Read and Review I want to know what you think! Feedback is important!

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**Chapter 6 On The Journey to Anywhere**

After the meal the Speaker lead Envy and the Doctor to the spire the Paradox had shown him the day before. While the incident left a bad taste in Envy's mouth, this time it was at least the only scene he saw.

They stood at the base of the spire, in front of a basin filled with the wine-red serum that was life-blood of Homunculi. Sweeping out from the spire was a delicate sculpture of a phoenix in an eagle's dive, the trailing edge of the wings and body clothed in flame and a heron's head in mid-dart. Once in a while, a drop of the precious elixir would fall from its long beak into the center of the basin. Strange, how something so poetic could be thought up by beings that ate souls.

"Just put your hand in," the Speaker instructed. "You'll know when you've had enough."

Envy looked into the liquid, and tentatively placed his palm on the surface. His skin tingled from the souls wicking up into his body. Souls of different species did have a different taste to them, something he never thought about- never having anything other than human souls before. This type had a meaty, robust flavor, in contrast to human souls, which he would now describe more like the first honey harvest of the season.

"What are these souls from?"

The Doctor sighed. "You can guess."

"Oh! Yuurlnat?"

The Speaker grinned impishly. "We couldn't get the ones on the surface, but the ones in the ships inside the sphere were quite near at hand."

"Huh?"

The Speaker rocked back and forth on his feet, his odd-eyes sparkling. "You may have thought about it or you may have not, but a circle is what a sphere would be in a two dimensional space, and a circle from any perspective in a three dimensional space is a sphere. Now, while it is mathematically impossible to turn a circle- that's 2-D- inside out, it is possible to do it with a sphere, which is in 3-D*.

Envy took a second before he made the connection. "A transmutation… _sphere_… turned inside out… so that the planet… New Gallifray… is on the outside, and the rest of the universe is on the inside. It's… bigger on the inside." He grinned brilliantly. Math had always been one of Envy's aquantanices, but he now began to realize what a good friend he had in it.

"That's something only Time Lord Homunculi would do," the Doctor sighed.

"Hey, we only use the souls near death, so nothings' interfered with, temporally speaking," the Speaker responded.

"And what about the Yuurlnat on the ships?" the Doctor rebutteled.

"They _were_ near death. They wanted to take the water we need for our lives. We have our rights. It's not like we let their lives go to waste."

The Doctor turned to Envy. "Well, we better get going. And don't give me that look." Envy stood on one foot; the other tucked behind, and shied away with his hands behind his back. His eyes had the look of a scolded puppy, but his mouth was curled into an upside-down smile. The Doctor sighed and shook his head. "Well, it's not like you're to be cured in a day. Come on."

Envy broke into a big smile and bounded after the Time Lord as the Speaker trotted along beside him.

* * *

Later on, the Paradox gave Envy the official send off to begin his apprenticeship, and he traded good-byes with the Speaker and Idle. As the Doctor revved up the TARDIS, Envy shrugged his knapsack ("it's kind of useful to be able to carry stuff with you incase you need it," the Doctor said) off his shoulder and explored the place a bit more. There was a room filled with an endless array of clothes with a spiral staircase ascending right in the middle of it, and beneath the floor grill there was a massive tangle of engine parts. Not even millenniums-advanced aliens seemed to get away from that. "Where're we going?" he finally asked.

"_When_ is the right question, but where can apply," the Doctor said. "Past or future? Up to you."

Envy gaped. "Oh, um, future, I guess," he said.

"Okie-dokie, the future it is then. I know just where to go." The Doctor once again set about dashing around the column making adjustments to the controls. Envy once again stood mesmerized by the moving unearthly lights and the whirrings of the TARDIS's engine.

After a while Envy returned to reality and asked quite suddenly, "You don't seem like the fighting type- what'd you do?"

"Well, the Paradox caught the commander of the Yuurlnats and we all had a little talk. It's important that they need to understand the needs of others too."

"Vaguely stated: I like," Envy purred.

"I also suggested that the Paradox and the Leaver should do something about keeping unwanted guests out. Gallifray- the old one- had a quantum force field protecting it."

"You said that word- "quantum"- again. What's it mean?"

"Oh, broadly speaking, on really, really, really small scales- individual atoms and smaller- the differences between particles and energy become indistinguishable."

"Oh," Envy replied. What was going on in that level of existence was something he never fully understood, but Envy never really bothered to learn about it before. _'I could have asked Father about it;'_ Envy thought,_ 'he of all people would have known what's it like on that small a scale. But then again, if he wouldn't have said anything if he figured we didn't need to know it.' _

"It's something any decent alchemic theory would predict if looked at it the right way," the Doctor continued. "But the quantum world is so unlike anything alchemists are usually used to that they often see it as hogwash. It usually takes at least a century or so for the idea to gain a foothold among alchemists. Probably all that dark matter- it really gets them that something exists that they can't interact with even theoretically."

Envy felt somewhat slighted by the universe. "I don't like it."

"Why?"

"I don't know. I just don't. Alchemy is what created me and it can't- it can't… I don't know," Envy said at last. He shrugged in defeat.

"You're just not used to the idea that you know that what you know is nothing in comparison to what you know that you don't know, and that that pales in comparison to what you don't know that you don't know. You'll get used to it. It's fun." And with that the Doctor shot Envy a bemused glance and said, "Earth, the year six-thousand four-hundred eighty-three."

"Really?"

"See for yourself."

Envy drew a big breath and rushed to the door and swung it open. He almost stumbled outside of the TARDIS as the Doctor strolled in tow. They landed in a plant conservatory that shared its place with city streets. The humid air was trapped within a glass film that stretched between the buildings hundreds of feet above them. Beyond the barrier there were the buildings reaching into the heavens, an army of mirrors sending sunlight into the flourishing realm below.

"This is so… _different_. Four and a half thousand years into the future…"

"Yeah," the Doctor said. "A lot can change."

" 'A lot can…' Doctor, _what has changed?_"

"Do you want to see? Come along then. It's something you got to see for yourself." The Doctor lead Envy to a nearby building, where before getting into the lobby, they were stopped by someone imposing figure, with no natural movement or change of expression. Its voice was a mechanical monotone and it never blinked. The Doctor talked their way into the building as Envy listened intently. At the end, the Doctor pulled a small metal rod out of his pocket and pointed it at the guard. It emitted a high chittering and blue light that seemed to have a pacifying effect on the figure.

As they walked on, Envy asked, "Was that full body auto-mail, or do they accept binding human souls now?"

"That was neither," the Doctor said. "That was an android, an artificial intelligence, something programmed. Nothing about it is or had been alive."

Envy turned, peering back at the metal figure. "You said that things have changed. Humans are as now inane as they were back in the old days. They're just asking for trouble now."

"I said 'things _can_ change', not that they necessarily do. And yes, you're right, they still like to play high risks with their lifestyles." The Doctor led Envy to two brushed steel panels set deep into the wall. He pushed a button on the wall and after a few moments, the two panels slid apart revealing a small, boxy room with a strip of steel railing at hip-height running around the room.

Elevators had only just been invented in Envy's time, but this was the first time he had been on one. He had heard that they were clunky and noisy and they moved jerkily, but this one- having several thousand years of between it and its origins, only whirred quietly and moved between a set speed and nothing.

The two had continued talking until three other people got on. The arrivals stood, facing the door, expressionless, and said nothing. Envy faltered mid-sentence when he noticed this. It was like they were the perfect soldiers, stock-still and awaiting orders. Envy began to feel antsy. It didn't feel right. Something about the damn box. In due time each got off on their proper spot. But others came and went, doing just as the rest did.

At last they got to their stop, top floor. Envy followed the Doctor to a window, where he saw a vista of countless mirrored towers, and far off in the distance… Nothing. A barren wasteland. "This is Chaermane, originally called West City," the Doctor explained.

"What happened? It never was like this."

"The Great Desert spread west. As Amestris became heavier populated, there were more people to feed and water. The city is completely sealed off from the outside, so that water for the plants isn't lost."

"They've created their own ecosystem, in other words. Like New Gallifray. Are the other cities like this?"

"The main ones are, but the smaller towns and villages turned to the desert lifestyle. Cities like this aren't even possible without the aid of alchemists."

"Are they isolated from each other?"

"No, they're still in contact, but there's still no consensus on how to right this."

Envy leaned against the window, staring off into space, conflicted. On one hand, it was just what the humans deserved; they brought it on themselves. On the other, if Father were here, he could correct this, and there would be_ willing_ sacrifices for him. '_Idiots._' "It can recover on its own, can it," the Homunculus said, more of a statement than a question.

"Yes," said the Doctor, " and it's probably for the best."

Envy sighed, and feeling chilled in the high atmosphere, he placed a hand on his queasy stomach. "Seems like every time anyone tries to change something in a big way, they fuck up in a bigger way and don't know about it until years later," he said softly.

"Feeling homesick?"

"Maybe a little. It's not my fault," he added on.

The Doctor didn't reply. Envy felt vilified; for all that the Homunculi would have done, Humans still did worse, and they never challenged themselves about it. His family was hated for being the incarnation of the Human emotions that cause misery, but the Humans never thought that they should have avoided the sort of things that bring about Homunculi in the first place. And they never learned.

"So what's so great about here? And now?" Envy asked finally.

Just then the tower shuttered and the glass facade shattered from the building. "Don't know," the Doctor said. "Let's find out." Envy grinned wickedly and took off with the Doctor.

Several floors down (they took the stairs), and they located where the shake originated. A young woman tumbled out of a room, righted herself and smashed a black tablet over the dome of a large canister, then took off in their direction when the Doctor shouted "Over here!"

He handed her over to Envy, and carefully approached the object.

The thing spoke. "We have been detected," it said. "Exterminate! EXTERMINATE! **EXTERMINATE!"

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*See .com/watch?v=BVVfs4zKrgk and .com/watch?v=x7d13SgqUXg&feature=related to see how.


	7. Chapter 7: Monsters

**Author's Note: This semester, I'm taking a few classes with heavy workloads. I will try to keep ahead of the chapters, but life being what it is, I might not post polished chapters regularly. If you've come this far, in Toxic Toast, then you probably want to see it play out, and I am VERY grateful for the dedication and interest you've shown for my story. I should have mentioned by now that I'm trying to base it off a season of Doctor Who. Holy Crap! That's ten more-or-less disconnected stories! What have I got myself into? Well, for one thing, lots of opportunity for character development. Will Envy come to follow in the Doctor's footsteps (or at least in his general direction)? Read and review. I do not own FMA or Doctor Who.**

**Chapter 7 Monsters**

"Dalek," the Doctor said darkly, his stance tensed.

"Those canned squid?" Envy asked, surprised. He didn't expect the oldest enemy of his new people to come up so soon. "Why Earth?"

"You know our race," it said. "Who are you?"

"You don't know, Dalek? I would have never thought your kind would forget me."

For a brief moment, it hesitated. Then, "You are the Doctor. You are the Enemy. You and your Human friends will be EXTERMINATED!"

Envy took the chance to whip his arm out- tipped with eagles' talons- and smash the Dalek into the wall. " 'Friends,'" Envy said, "from what I heard I didn't think you'd knew the meaning of the word."

The Doctor herded the other two into the stairwell, and with his screwdriver, locked the door.

"What are you doing? There are still people out there!" the woman shouted. "Who are you? What are those things?"

"Those people won't be people much longer whether we try t'save 'em or not, lady," Envy said as he dragged her down the stairwell.

"You! You're horrible! A monster!"

"You're not the first to say that," the Homunculus replied. "Doctor! Where do we go from here?"

"Get off at the next floor- the lock won't hold them for long, but if they don't know which floor we escaped to…"

They clamored into a hallway and barged into the first office they saw. "Everyone remain calm!" the Doctor cried. "I'm the Doctor and these are my two lovely assistants. There's been a teensy problem upstairs but with the cooperation of you folk we'll get this all straightened out in a jiffy." He ousted one office worker from his seat, and took over the glowing upright tablet the man was working at.

"Hey "

"Fate of the world work, buddy," Envy said. "Those one of those computers you mentioned?"

"Yeah. If I can get into the building's security systems, then I can figure out what the Dalek are up to."

"How do you not know what a computer is?"

Envy gave here a look. "Ever hear of 'time travel'? I came from the year nineteen-fourteen to say this: WE'VE GOT BIGGER ISSUES HERE."

"How Who are you?"

"Envy. And you, honey-bear?"

She stiffened up proudly. "Elisa Grant. Journalist." She was taller than Envy by half a head, and somewhat of a stocky build. You couldn't call her fancy, but the sandy blonde girl had a bit of spitfire in her light blue eyes.

"Journalist, huh? What'll it take to keep a secret?"

"Envy," the Doctor scolded.

"Hey, I saved our lives back there- it's not my fault the girl took it badly."

"What are you?" again she asked.

"Many things. Most you wouldn't believe," he smirked.

"Are you going to kill me?"

"If I wanted to, why'd I drag you with me? But as for the Dalek, _**now**_ they'll be _**interesting**__,_" Envy purred. In fact, he was kneading the back of the chair in anticipation, grinning mad like the Cheshire Cat1 that he was.

"Found it!" the Doctor cried. "And here we are, and the Dalek were there. Let's see… nothing, nothing, nothing… AH there! Fortieth floor!"

"That's maintenance- they have maintenance levels every twenty floors." Elisa said.

"Perfect place for the Dalek to hide. They always go for the tucked away parts in major landmarks."

Envy leaned over the Doctor's shoulder and peered at the layout on the screen. "Those… things- the equipment- it's all very decorative. Is there a way I can see them better?" The Doctor fiddled around on the keyboard a bit more. "Thanks. Ah, thought so. Don't recognize any of the patterns specifically, but I know Amestris alchemic symbols when I see them."

"And if you look at the way they're laid out…" the Doctor added.

"Connect the dots and you've got a transmutation circle," Envy finished. He smirked. "From the very beginning, someone's been a rat. Working with the Dalek. What a fool."

"What's it do?" Elisa asked.

"How should I know? I already said I don't recognize the elements in it. All I can tell by the basic pattern it that melds together whatever things're in the circle."

"If someone is working with the Dalek- it's happened before " the Doctor said, "then it's an alchemist who's in league with them- Dalek can't do alchemy on their own."

"What'd anyone have to gain from the squid?" Envy asked.

"The promise of power. And it's always a lie."

Envy snorted. "How is it that one bastard sees another bastard and thinks that the other won't stab him in the back if opportunity arises if they decide to work together? It's so stupid- I can't believe there are still humans that think that way."

"Envy," the Doctor said.

"You really are a monster."

"Well, honey-bear, I'm not keeping you here. Why don't you just run, then?"

_"Envy."_

Elisa stiffened again. "THOSE things _are_ monsters. I've seen what they do. They've got to be stopped."

Envy stared before grinning leery. "Girl, you got guts. I like your stuff. See if you don't get yourself killed. I'd like to find out what you'll do. You gonna report on this or what?"

_"Envy!"_

"_Whaat!_"

"Go see where the Dalek are," the Doctor said. Then to Elisa, "Sorry about him- he has an… interesting background. I'm working on it.

The Homunculus snorted again and left the room. He saw in a convex mirror that the hallway was empty. Creeping over to the stairwell door, Envy sent some of his fingers under the threshold, and created eyes at the tips. Finding nothing in that area, he sent his fingers both up and down the stairs. Several floors down, the Dalek were hovering their way through the passage. He retreat his fingers and reported.

"Four of 'em," he said. "Eight floors beneath us. They don't even seem to be looking for us."

"That means they're ready to put their plan into action," the Doctor concluded. "Let's go. The elevator."

"The elevator? It'd be faster. Why wouldn't they take that?" Elisa asked.

Envy rolled his eyes. "Geez. Imagine someone opening the door onto them, and then screaming. That attracts attention. Then the squid have to take time to nix everyone in earshot," Envy paused to let her respond. She didn't, and he went on. "Now say you got one person in a sealed off area someplace not used as much, who can't see the Dalek coming. Less people to kill means fewer delays- and more for sacrifice if need be."

"I can't believe anyone can think that way." Elisa said

"Well, the Dalek do," the Doctor responded. "It's good to have someone who knows how to think like the ones you're fighting."

Envy gave Elisa a huge smile, one that shuts the eyes, revealing his sharpened teeth. Elisa shifted her weight and watched the floors count down.

The elevator came to a halt at the forty-third floor. The doors wouldn't open. "Shit!" "No no no NO _NO!_" Then the lights went dark.

"What!" Elisa cried.

The Doctor bolted over to panel and pointed his sonic screwdriver at it. Envy had studied bioluminescence, but for the first time had a use for it. He began to glow. "Wh_at?_" he asked after seeing Elisa's reaction.

The Doctor cursed. "It's no use. They've completely shut off the power to the elevator." He looked up at the ceiling and then directed the screwdriver toward one odd panel in it. "That won't stop us though." He jumped up, popped the panel to the side, and pulled himself up.

Envy crouched, wrapped his arms around Elisa's knees and hoisted her up through the opening. She protested, but took the Doctor's arm to pull her through. Envy followed.

The Doctor lead the group to the elevator shaft's ladder, where they clamored all the way down the remaining three stories. Arriving at the right door, they heard beyond it the muffled voices of the Dalek, speaking to another, more organic voice. "The rouge alchemist…" the Doctor said.

Envy licked his lips. "Well, what are we waiting for? Let's crash a party, shall we?" He transmuted his lower half into a snake to give himself an anchor around the ladder, and dug his fingers in between the elevator doors. He heard the room on the other side fall silent. His chuckle came from the bowels of Hell. "_Weee'rrrree heee-errrrre__,_" he crooned as forced the gates open.

1 Alice in Wonderland- yet another Book I must read. (And it fits him so much!)


	8. Chapter 8: Friends and Enemies

**Author's Note: And now the fun begins! I do not own DW or FMA. Read and Review, please! I beg of you!**

**Chapter 8 Friends and Enemies**

Envy's tongue hung out between his teeth, lips parted in a wolfish grin. The white of one of his eyes turned dead black as seven pupils and crimson irises swam madly in the other.

Then his hyena laugh was cut short by the Dalek's death ray blast. The Doctor tensed at the sight of the Homunculus's green backlit skeleton and Elisa suppressed a scream. As Envy slipped limp to hang from the ladder, currents of energy ran over his body.

"Envy!" Elisa cried in a harsh whisper.

The Doctor jumped onto the landing, and confronted the Dalek.

"It's always Earth, isn't it? There must be some reason, some… thing about humans that always makes you come back, isn't there…?"

Elisa, from her perch on the ladder, flinched when she realized that the skin and body of Envy were moving and gathering like suppressed spring.

"_Aarrrggh…"_ then the mass of crimson and jet coils snapped and lunged through the threshold. Envy was insulted. The Dalek is a mutant race that were pitied by a mad scientist. How dare that thing look down on him, Envy, a being created with purpose? "_Bastard!__ That hurt!__" _

"What is this?" All that the Dalek could see was the snapping of a whip around its tank.

"They say that your weakness is the eyepiece," Envy said. He raised his arm to show its hands growing talons. "Let's see… _ah-haha_."

Striking like a viper, the Homunculus plunged his talons into the tube. He gripped the other side of the dome with his free hand, and tightened his coils around the unit. Deeper and deeper he sent his arm like a tidal surge until it found the cavern. Still he did not stop. Even a Dalek could scream in the horrors of dismemberment. Envy was humming "Daisy, Daisy" while he was at it. The Homunculus salivated as he felt organs give way to tearing claws and the blood from ruptured veins splattering against his skin. "I give you peace," he whispered through a soft, archaic smile.

As the Dalek's cries died, Envy let out a satisfied sigh and fiddled around in the tank. The death-ray came loose. "Equivalent exchange." He returned to his human form and picked up the gun. "I'd say it's fair." He flicked his eyes up onto the watching Dalek, then to the Doctor.

"Envy," the Time Lord said, which caused the Homunculus's expression to melt a little.

"You have chosen a companion very much like a Dalek," an on-looking Dalek replied.

"I know what he is," the Doctor replied. "But you, why the interest in alchemy all of a sudden?"

"It is necessary."

" 'Necessary?' Necessary for what?"

"Dalek are supreme. We must retain our greatness. The Dalek must attain alchemy."

"You want to become alchemists? How's that possible? You can't do it alone."  
"So who's the rat?" Envy purred.

"All beings are vermin compared to Dalek. Your words mean nothing."

The sound of metal scraping cement interrupted the argument. "I am no rat," said a monotone voice. "And you are not authorized personnel."

"The guard," the Doctor was exasperated. "No way- the screwdriver shut down the circuits. This can't be real."

"Anthony?" Elisa said quietly. She crept up and hid behind Envy without his knowing.

"What? _What?_" the Doctor said, puzzled. "Since when could androids use alchemy?"

"Androids have never been alchemists. But I am not an android," it said.

"Then what " Envy knew. "You're a bound soul."

"It is a constant battle between the programming and I," the android said. "And I thank you; for it was you, Doctor, who shut down the computer completely."

"Anthony Hobelmann! Is it you? Your voice! It's Anthony's!" Elisa dashed from behind Envy and embraced the android. "It's me! Elisa Grant! From college?"

"Elisa Grant… yes, I remember."

Envy and the Doctor were baffled. "Wha…?" they said.

"Oh, Anthony, what happened?"

"An experiment gone wrong. Something you could never contemplate."

"Let me guess," Envy interrupted, "something that can't be reversed without paying a price higher than you want to talk about. Much higher."

"You, you speak of prices, shape shifter. I wonder- there is a legend, written in the rarest of texts, that there once was a secret race of humans that were not natural. Born of sacrificed souls. They were named after the Deadly Sins, is that not right, 'Envy?'"

Envy stood agape then darkened. "So we're legend, is it?" he growled. "You're hardly one to talk. You went too far yourself, and you're still going. What do you get out of this? It has to be something. Equivalent exchange, right?"

"Freedom from this form. A higher state of being."

"Not to return to normal, right?" the Doctor reasoned. "No one in allegiance with the Dalek would ask for that."

"Human flesh is weak. The death of the body is the death of the person."

"Anthony," Elisa whispered, "what are you saying?"

"I will have many bodies," the Android said.

"Oh, how clear now," Envy smiled, leaning on the tank of the deceased Dalek,

"You want to become a chimera with the Dalek- not one- but _all of them_. How arrogant.

"It's amazing," he went on, "that Homunculi are still thought of as _just legend_. With all the time between the Amestris war and now, I'm surprised nothing like us has come up since then, considering how often humans repeat themselves."

"You plan on creating a telepathic link between the Dalek using yourself as the bridge, giving you freedom of movement, and the Dalek alchemy," the Doctor realized. "You really are mad. And you, Dalek- you've tried things like this before, only to reject them in the end. What makes this time any different?"

"We will not fail. We will have alchemy. The Dalek will remain superior."

"Idiots. You're just idiots." Envy sighed. Then he raised the death ray. "But I hope you make this interesting."

"Stop! This is crazy!" Elise cried. "You don't have to do this! Anthony! Envy!"

"Impudent woman," the android said, casting her into the path of a Dalek.

The Doctor pointed the screwdriver at the Dalek, impeding its ability to fire the ray. "you were her friend!" The Doctor's face was strained with anger, advancing toward the android.

"Correct. She was."

"You're no better than Greed," Envy's voice was low. Greed, his younger "brother," was the bastard who abandoned Father for his own filthy desires. Envy shot his arms out to pull Elisa back and out of the way. "Betraying your kind for your own personal gain. The Homunculi may have been psychopaths, but the rest of us were at least loyal to our own."

"You would make a good Dalek, Homunculus named Envy." One of the Dalek stated.

"You said that already. What of it, Squid?"

"You have destroyed a Dalek. A replacement is needed. You would make us more supreme."

Envy snarled. "Never. I am not a dog bred for the sake of you worms."

"RUN!" the Doctor yelled. "They're in their places!"

For a second time, Envy was hit with a blast. He collapsed to the floor and the Doctor rushed to his side. The android clapped his hands, circulating the energy needed for the alchemic transmutation.

"Think about what you're doing, Anthony!" the Doctor pleaded. "You'll never be able to revert!"

"That is not my intent."

"Doctor, help," Elisa gasped. She was trying to drag the limp form the circle. "He's not moving. Why?"

"The Doctor and the Human are not needed. Exterminate!" One Dalek ordered.

The Doctor's screwdriver malfunctioned a second Dalek blaster before the three remaining began to advance. They intended to use their vacuum arms. The Doctor scooped up Envy by the shoulder.

"It's probably interference from the circle's near-activation that Envy's not regenerating. We get him out of here, and…" It was the edge of the elevator shaft.

Elisa and the Doctor did not let go of Envy. As the energy of his regeneration took him, their screams woke the Homunculus up. What they heard next was the screech of torn metal. They found themselves clinging to the wing pinions of a dragon whose claws gouged the wall. The beast was gulping air, steely eyed. Those canned squid were _mocking_ him. Envy wouldn't let that go unanswered. His tail whipped out and jarred the nearest set of elevator doors open, where he clamored out.

"Well, that was a fun trip," the Doctor said once back on solid ground. Envy, now back in human form, and Elisa both gave him a look. "Let's see, the Dalek are after the Homunculus, attempting to become alchemists themselves, and we're a few flights down from where all the fun stuff is happening. Did I miss anything?"

"How about 'dying isn't fun?'"

"Hey! What about Anthony?"

"Oh. Right you are then. Well come on, let's see what we can do next."

"I have an idea. Why don't we wipe those canned bastards out of existence? It'd be a great stress reliever."

"It might not be that easy; they've always found a way to escape." The Doctor led them back to the stairwell. "At the very least we can destroy the circle."

"How?" Envy asked with a grunt. "We don't even know what it's made of, other than paint. Even then, it could be activated."

"And there's still… still…" Elisa faltered.

"You still worried about the robot?_ Sheesh._ News flash, Journo: he doesn't _care about you _anymore."

"You're heartless." Elisa let out a small sob.

"So is he."

"Enough you two," the Doctor said.

"Fine then. Shouldn't we be going up stairs?" Envy said.

"Not if we want to get to the TARDIS."

"What's in there?" The Homunculus asked. "Apart from the obvious."

"Oh, I'm thinking about that. Thinking, thinking… What would be a good, all-around paint remover?"

"Fluorine? That stuff removes anything. Even snake-poison."

"Not what I had in mind, En. And don't suggest anything that would compromise the stability of the building, please."

A green flash sent down the gap in the stairs lighted their way.

"On second thought, this seems like a good floor to be on. Come on."

Envy scoffed. "Maintenance again? You're brilliant, Doctor."

"Oh, I know. See here?"

"A Tesla coil?" Elisa guessed.

"Yep. Never know when you'll need vast amounts of electrical energy."

Envy whistled. "They sure have changed. But I think I know where you're going, and I want to come with." He watched the Doctor dash around, grabbing this and that, pointing the sonic screwdriver at various devises, and generally fiddle with the coil in a hurried manner.

"What are you thinking?"

"Let's wait and see," Envy said. "I'm curious as to what the good Doctor thinks."

"Done." The Doctor hauled the device out of room and set it on the landing.

"Doctor…?"

Envy smiled and leaned against the wall. "It's me they want. The canned squid can't carry me, so that means that the tin-man will. And take a look at what the stairs are made of."

"Cast iron," Elisa said. "Doctor, you can't!"

The Doctor leapt over the device and charged up the first flight of stairs. "Anthony!" He called. "Stop what you're doing! I know how you feel but you don't know what you're giving up!"

"Hey " Envy cried. "What's with this?" The robot was the enemy and dead-set on killing. As far as Envy could see, there wasn't any point in reasoning.

"What you're doing is insane! Re- Remember what it was like in the Truth? How much more of a toll can you pay? If you do this, you will lose everything that makes you human!"

"Human?" the android stopped on the landing above Envy and Elisa.

"Tch! He's wasting time! All that sympathizing," Envy snarled to himself.

"I have lost my humanity long ago, when I was given this body."

"See!"

The android stared down through the grate. Envy's expression fell. "You are the replacement and the upgrade, Homunculus."

Elisa pleaded again. "Anthony! Stop it! Can't you see what you're doing? I know about the old legends too! I know about the sacrifices it takes to do anything like this! _You are human!_ You can't do this! Th-The people, they have loved ones- just like you," she chocked out.

Anthony was silent. Then: "I have loved ones? Incorrect."

"What?" Elisa asked weakly.

"You killed your own family?" Envy roared. He remembered hearing of Lust's death. To have lost his closest sibling and his best friend. The shock and humiliation he felt when Pride callously announced her death to the world, just after that fruitless battle. The agony of Mustang's flames he knew she felt. The loneliness it all came to. And this man- this…_ thing_ felt nothing. _To have nothing and feel nothing and not care._ No, Envy would not be melded with this bastard. "You had everything… and you were so greedy… you cast it all aside. I may felt that never had what I needed, BUT _YOU_ DIDN'T APPRECIATE_**ANY OF YOURS!**_"

He shot his hand up, engulfing the android's throat in his grasp, dragging him down the flight. Envy bellowed with every ounce of fury he possessed.

The Doctor directed the screwdriver at the Tesla coil. It was clear that any hope fell to this. Electric current ran through the stairwell.

Envy's body felt like it was liquefying, every particle separate, but rolling as a whole. Somehow- _somehow_ he pushed himself and Elisa back into the maintenance room. His head was swimming and his tissues jittering. He didn't know how long he was there, but he forced himself up from the floor- as much as he could, and tried to blink the pulses of raw color from his eyes. Envy crawled over to the coil's power supply, grasped the switch, and fell flat to the floor. It felt like he would disintegrate. Pushing himself up, he reached a second time, and told his hands to hold tight and his abs to tense. Then he threw his weight into dropping the switch and collapsed on the floor. The hum of killer bees stopped.

Envy pulled himself back to Elisa. Pale, breathing shallowly, but he could feel a pulse. '_Tough woman, for a human,'_ he thought. "Doctor…?"

"Erg, _gah!_ Oww… yeah?"

"You 'k?"

"Had worse. You?"

"Same. Elisa'll make it. How's everything?"

"Anthony won't. Not with a seal burnt like that."

"Oh. What about the Dalek?"

"Ehh, they probably got fried," the Doctor reasoned. "If they stayed in the circle, the alchemic build up from the attempted transmutation probably got them when the electricity hit."

"Ah. Good." Envy said. "We should probably check," he suggested after a pause.

"Yeah. I agree with that."

"'K." Envy rolled over and pushed himself all the way up. Still unsteady, he made his way up to the Doctor and helped him up. "I don't feel like climbing twenty flights. Let's see if the elevator is working." It was. But the Dalek had gone.

"They teleported out. They've escaped." The Doctor determined, scanning with the screwdriver. "Probably figured that there wasn't any point to stay when they heard you snap. Figured that was the end of their alchemist."

"So they'll be back. Shit! The bastards."

Envy was careful not to act too suspicious- he had quite discreetly stowed away the blaster a certain Dalek was too… _scatterbrained_… to know what to do with. If the Doctor didn't notice- fat chance- Envy planned on modifying it as a way of teaching himself about the technological advances that had gone on since his time. Good, wholesome stuff; practical things you ought to know about.

"You coming?" the Doctor called out the TARDIS door. Envy stopped fishing around and listened. "You've' earned it." He was talking to Elise. "Also," the Doctor said in a lower voice, "I need someone who can remind me what the better part of humanity is like."

Envy went back to his knapsack. Someone to tease- it might not be so bad, even if she is human.

"Traveling the stars with two maniacs?" Elisa called from outside. "Sounds like a story."


	9. Chapter 9:  Good Intentions?

**Author's Note: Hiya there! I've done some thinking, and I've got to say that with all the adventures Envy's going to have with the Doctor and Elisa, we won't be seeing much of Envy's new buddies back on New Gallifray. That much being said, I've decided to include "Bonus Chapters" at the end of every adventure, so we can make sure our little anti-hero is doing alright. I should also note that these bonus chapters are not going to be in order to the rest of the story.**

**Bonus Chapter: … **_**Good**_** Intentions…?**

Envy launched himself up into the air, all four front limbs lunging at the solid image of a Stingray. He caught the trailing edge of one wing in one paw, the tail in the other. He scratched for a foothold with the other pair. The Stingray couldn't hold onto the altitude, and Envy tried to claw its underside with his hind feet; one of the second pair of his hind legs got caught in the Stingray's maw, and it immediately took to trying to eat him.

Ineffectively, Envy tried to gouge away at the Stingray's neck with his last clawed foot, but the stalwart flight collided with the solidity of the earth. It gave Envy a shock, he was sent tumbling and blood-rushed with the Stingray into the ground. The earth clobbered his head hard, sudden and leaden, and he lost his grip with the Stingray. A shocked gasp escaped Envy as he felt the vertebrae of his neck crunch together, and he crumpled in a hideous mass. Skull thundering, Envy's entire frame gave a violent shake before he lay still. He wanted to stay like that for a while.

"See what I mean?" the gruff voice said. Envy heard the Viewer's heavy footfalls coming to stand before his left eye, but the world was still churning, and Envy did not want to see it.

"_Ugh,"_ Envy let out an ill moan.

The Viewer snorted in disgust. "Quit acting so petty. Look at me." Envy barely peeled his eye open, three of the eye's seven pupils peeking out. The Viewer's hands thrust into his coat pockets, he was staring Envy down. Envy sighed and started to right himself. "Your true form may look more scary with eight legs, but that's all they do." He spat. "Your 'Father' must have been drunk-pissed off his ass to make you like that." Envy said nothing, but rearranged his hind legs beneath him, but spread his front legs out for balance- it was a _really_ hard landing. He bent his head low to the ground, continuing to listen to the other Time Lord's spiel, but also to lose the light headedness. "Your extra legs only get in the way- they're not designed to move like a bug's."

"I'm at my strongest when I'm in this form," Envy feebly explained, knowing what would come next.

"What good is it if doesn't connect?" the Viewer countered. "You're wasting power if you can't focus it."

Envy licked his lips, and after a second tried to reiterate the Viewer's point. "So I'd fight better with a 'smarter' design even if it doesn't match my true form's raw power."

The Viewer grunted in approval. "Let's try this again." He strode to a spot twenty feet* away and recreated his Stingray hologram.

Envy crackled and took the form of a leopard, whose shoulder stood even with an elephant's. As the Stingray soared towards him, Envy circled around, picked up into a jog then into full sprint as the hologram flew past. Envy's haunches coiled and released as he sprung atop the Stingray. It felt better- much more natural- to leap powered by two hind legs that are stationed beneath him instead of four splayed off to the side.

Not that it changed the ultimate outcome much: his massive weight still dragged the Stingray to the earth. The drawn out collision threw Envy off the hologram, tumbling and rolling. He shook the shock off, only to find the Stingray charging.

"NO FAIR!" Envy screamed, and turned to evade those gaping jaws. The Stingray sunk its teeth into Envy's flank, and torn out a good chunk. Envy took off in another direction, his monstrous cat-form no more effective than his true one. The Stingray could attack from any direction. _'I've gotta get away…"_ He located the hologram, going into another threatening dive. _'Ah… now I've got it,"_ Envy began to sprint away, the Stingray came in. Envy's body crackled. As the Stingray opened its mouth, Envy pushed the size of his body to even greater than that of his true form.

He spread his arms out wide, and ignored the stretching sensation of rachis breaching his skin, the vanes filling out; he could already feel the feathers catch the wind. His body left the ground and he completed his transformation. His arms now wings, he gave a good few powerful beats and pulled up and out of the path of the hologram. He climbed in the air, a golden eagle the size of a whale.

Wheeling above the earth, Envy wondered why he never tried this before. Staying confined to the ground for so long, the depraved shape-shifter could have been freer than any of his siblings, if only he had dared to think it. But he thought it now, and cried in laughter. He saw his shadow trailing him on the ground, but he was free of it. Envy remembered how Humans would watch birds fly, and wish the same for themselves. Hell, if Fullmetal could see him now, he'd eat his "you're just jealous of Humans" shit. Envy caught the sight of the Stingray, which was circling up to him.

Envy found himself in an updraft, and he soared higher, until the Stingray flew into the same current and began to climb. Envy climbed up and turned out of the draft, watching the hologram. Envy tipped in the air and pulled his wigs in. He plummeted. The screaming wind tore tears from his eyes, but he didn't care. The Stingray took up more and more of Envy's field of vision, and drew his wings out again as he extended his feet.

_**SN-NATCH-CH!**_

The Stingray flashed out of sight, and in his talons he had the Viewer snared. One talon had pierced the Viewer's side, and Envy hoped that the Viewer wouldn't hold it against him. Envy swept to the ground, back-winged in a momentary hover before landing and releasing the Homunculus from his grip.

The Viewer straightened up, and paced past Envy. "That's enough for today," was all he said.

"Oh, um- look, Viewer?" Envy said warily as he took to his human form again, "I never intended on killing you up there."

The Viewer stopped dead, turned and backhanded Envy with a powerful fist, which knocked the young Time Lord to the ground. "_ 'Never intended!' _" he planted his heavily booted foot on Envy's sternum. "I'm not teaching you how to fight so you _don't_ hurt people. _I_ was the one attacking-" he stamped, causing Envy to gasp for air, "-not a Stingray. That was just an image. And _further_-" he ground down as Envy tried to pry his foot away, "- _what_ was with that _dawdling _while you were flying! If I wasn't being so _nice-_" -_crack-_ "- I'd've shot right up there and ripped your head off. So no daydreaming." _Grind- grind_. "Got it?"

"Got, it," Envy gulped in air and nodded. The Viewer glared down at him before nodding curtly, and stormed away, pushing off with the foot Envy was trapped under. Envy rolled to his side and massaged his aching chest. He coughed hoarsely. When the Viewer offered (decided) decided to give Envy combat lessons, Envy thought that maybe the Viewer wasn't as pissed at him as he first thought. But maybe that wasn't the case.

* * *

*That's a little over 6m


	10. Chapter 10

**Author's Note: OK… assignments due in the next five weeks: 2 (or was it 3?) 5 page papers for Nature Writers', plus one 10 page and a referat; two 7-10 page stories for fiction writing (plus 40 pages of the cleaned up stories) and one public reading, one 10-12 page paper for Japanese Religious History, and 2 photo critiques (2 photos each and one 12 photo final portfolio… and what do I do? WORK ON MY COSPLAY COSTUME FOR A CON LESS THAN TWO WEEKS AWAY. Priorities, priorities. I do not own Doctor Who or FMA. And there was internet problems :(  
**

**Chapter 9 Signs of Things Hidden**

Ninety years had passed since the Amestris war, and the world had changed. For one, it was more connected now than ever before. Envy was shocked to learn that humans invented something that could actually make the world a better place- the Internet. He also found that it was the perfect place to waste time with mindless entertainment, spread lies about anything and everything, conduct scams, and harass people who hold too strong of views (or too poorly supported) without the realistic threat of physical retaliation. It was also conceivably the lovechild of an affair Grammar had with Chernobyl. It was all too fascinating, and after a week of introduction, he asked for a computer of own.

"Mac or PC?" the Doctor asked.

"Linux," Envy replied. The Doctor groaned. Linux are the computers of choice for hackers and virus writers. Leave it to Envy to find the underground of any cultural phenomenon. It was the image he was attracted to; there was no denying it given his cyber-punk style.

He was also infinitely curious about anything- something that was a good trait as far as a Time Lord's duty goes, but it was also one of the things the apprentice had difficulty curbing.

Yet, every once in a while, a child left to its own devices can come upon something important. Envy had no real reason to hack into a site meant specifically for certain engineers of the Large Hadron Collider, but that's what made it fun. He just wanted to learn about what he could do with a computer.

"Envy, look at where you are," the Doctor said. Envy was deeply immersed in the pastime and had not heard the Doctor come up behind him. The Homunculus jumped, lost footing as the wheelie chair scooted back and he got one foot caught in the tangle of wires. He hit the floor with a solid thud.

"On- on the ground now, yes," Envy supplied. The Doctor gave him a look. The Homunculus took a quick breath and said, "Oh- oh, you mean on the Internet! Um, um, Facebook?" The Doctor continued to stare. "Er- well… it was- you see… there's- there's this thing I wanted to learn about, yeah- and, and it was about particles and-"

"This isn't the design for a Hadron Collider, it's the plans for an artificial high-density gravity stimulator." The Doctor said.

"Oh- oh it is?" Envy failed to conceal his rise of hope that he might yet get out of trouble.

"And you know what that means." The Doctor turned back to Envy with a serious look.

Envy looked puzzled for a second and then said, "A black hole. Someone wants to make a black hole right on Earth. That would be bad."

The Doctor nodded.

"Who'd do that? What for? And that sounds a bit early for humans to be doing that."

"Exactly. So, let's get going."

"Where?" Elisa just came in from a Starbucks run. "Here you go, Envy I hope you like yours, it was the most expensive out of the lot."

"To save the world," the Doctor said. He took a sip of his drink and promptly set about readying the coordinates.

"Really?" Elisa replied, eyebrow quirked.

"Twenty ounce triple espresso with a double shot of English toffee creamer, orange syrup, whipped cream and sprinkled with nutmeg and anise?" Envy asked.

"Yes. And you owe me a scalp message that meets national safety regulations because my brain had to remember all of that."

"What?" the Homunculus slapped on a pseudo-shocked expression in his face. "I wouldn't do anything to give you brain damage- who else could I reliably count on at being abhorred at the thoughts I say out loud?"

"You say a lot of things- _in an overtone in public!_"

"I think you're getting hung up on details."

The TADRIS landed. It was hidden in a grove of fir trees, and the trio stepped out onto a mountainside just beginning to green. They all took a sip of their coffees to ward off the chill of the wind. Envy transmuted some outerwear for himself.

"Ha-ha," Envy said. "This is one of the few times when someone will actually waltz on into an enemy base."

"The LHC most definitely came from humans," the Doctor said. "It's the ones who hijacked the plans who're the problem."

"Wait a minute, you guys keep saying the LHC, but I don't see anything." Elisa said.

"That's because it's built underground," Envy said. "It's a particle accelerator that's supposed to detect Higgs bosons. Well, that's what it should do."

"They don't know about them?"

"The idea is only a few decades old," the Doctor said. "It's only theory now. Come on, let's go."

Inside the base, the Doctor pointed out parts of the collider to the other two, as they strode past. It was the first time Envy saw the psychic paper- which the Doctor used go gain entrance, and while Envy could do a good job transmuting fake IDs, the paper had its pluses: no guessing at the designs of cards you never seen before, and they don't disappear when handed over. "I knew you couldn't be all that upstanding! That's what I like: emphasis on results. Kudos, Doctor!" The Doctor rolled his eyes and ignored his apprentice's comment.

The Doctor led them into an area under construction. Even though Envy had seen the schematics of the supercollider, seeing it in real life made him faze out. The machines that moved the pieces into place dwarfed train engines alone. All this just to find evidence of some of the smallest bits of matter humans ever theorized of. The juggernauts of steel tunnels formed what would look like to an alchemist the foundation of one-hell-of-an ambitious alchemic ritual. "Why don't they hire an alchemist or two to help with this?" He asked when he caught up with the others.

"Remember," the Doctor replied, "that this is only 2007, so the theory they are testing is less than century old. Alchemists are still holding onto their pride– the implications of the "new theories" are seen as a threat– something that removes all the predictability from the world."

"Really?" Elisa asked. "I thought that relativity and quantum mechanics came out of alchemy."

"No, the records got muddled over the years," the Doctor replied.

"It feels weird, like I'm not supposed to be here." Envy looked around. "But– I can't believe I'm saying this– I can't believe that humans came up with something like this. I wonder if even Father could have thought of this."

"HEY!" a voice shouted. "Who're you?" a man, in a blindingly yellow vest stormed up to the three.

"I'm John Smith, technology consultant," the Doctor held up his psychic paper again. "And this is my intern, Evan Holmes, and journalist Elisa Grant."

"Well, what's the problem? I should have heard about it," the man groused.

"Oh, nothing, really," the Doctor replied, "just a few little things were found that we'd need to check out. I hope you don't mind, Mr… Bausch."

"Well, don't get in the way," the construction worker said.

"Sorry, we very much plan on getting in the way," Envy said under his breath.

Envy wandered under the tubes, staring up in awe. He thought he saw something disrupted the brushed steel finish. Climbing up a support and crawling upside-down on the spanner, he made his way over to the discontinuity. It was something weird. A design of sorts Envy had never seen before. Or rather, an array of designs. Writing? The TARDIS would have translated it. Envy fished his phone out of his pocket and took a picture. "Hey Doctor, I think I found something here." Envy returned his phone, let go and flipped to the ground, landing on all fours. He handed the phone to the Doctor.

"Oh, you sure did," the Doctor replied, putting on his glasses. "It looks like Rumullitaben to me."

"Who are?"

"Well, their kind tends to generalize. They lost their home planet in a supernova. They mostly became hired hands- any job, anywhere."

"And someone wants the Earth to go bye-bye. So who- and why?" Envy finished.

"Something strikes me as odd," Elisa said. The others turned to her. "Turning a planet into a black hole is a really complicated way to destroy it. The simplest way is by nuclear holocaust, for example."

"Then you mean that the black hole itself needed, and for whatever reason, the Earth is the best planet suited for the job," Envy reasoned.

"Good thinking!" the Doctor chimed. "So the question is who doesn't want to dirty their hands, and why they would stand to profit from destroying the Earth in such a specific way."

The Doctor lead the others to certain parts in the collider, having Envy make certain adjustments to the machine as the Doctor explained to him what the changes would do.

"Why not change it all, you're being so selective about it," Envy complained.

"Look at what we're altering," the Doctor replied. "These are critical points. If we manage to disrupt those ones alone, then the worst that will happen is that the simulator simply won't work."

"Fine, fine. Could you move the light a bit over then?" Envy asked.

"Um, guys?" Elisa said tentatively.

"We're alright up here, Elisa," the Doctor said.

"Hey, I said I needed the light over this way."

"Why should I do that?" Said a slimy voice above the Time Lords' heads.

They looked up to face it. "That, Envy, is a Rumullitaben." The alien was hanging from the rafters. Amphibious yellow skin aside, the thing had a sloth-like body, with long, toned limbs and curved talons. Attached to its snake-like neck was a head with too-huge brows, a nose like an elephant shrew's and horses lips.

"Ugly son-of-a-bitch," Envy commented. He leaned back and addressed the alien. "I don't suppose you'll part with information willingly, are you?" He moistened his lips.

"Envy," the Doctor warned.

"Because one way or another, we'll figure things out. Your choice: you can enlighten me or amuse me." Envy was picking at dirt beneath his nails. "Either way, I win."

"You are not the commissioners," the Rumullitaben replied.

"Oh, is that a problem?" Envy glanced at it.

"Under section 32 of the Shadow Proclamation, I order you to identify the ones who hired you," the Doctor said.

"You are not the commissioners, why should I listen?" the alien twisted its neck to look at the Doctor.

"Because," Envy shot his hands around its neck, eyes glinting, "if you don't, you're going to have to call in dismembered." The Homunculus tightened its grip with every gasp the alien emitted. "Oh _dreary me_, it seems that I'm not very witty today. Guess I'll have to compensate." Energy started crackling around the Homunculus: Envy's eyes glittered like a stalking cat, jaws softly parted; the massive form of a liger emerged, emitting a rumble like melted chocolate.

The alien detached its front two limbs from the rafters and jabbed at Envy with his talons. Envy lashed out with his claws, raking the alien's chest and limbs. Envy decided it was an even sorrier fighter than he was: exposing a soft belly to an animal with big pointy teeth. Well, soft under those plates of bone, he discovered. Those made it harder.

The Doctor took the chance to point the screwdriver into the machine till its parts popped and fumed.

Envy felt his knees give away as his opponent scooped them with its claws. It only made Envy claw his way upward, gouging out chunks of flesh out of the Rumullitaben's hind legs. Without Envy's good footing, the two swung, colliding with the Doctor, who managed to grab onto the mass. The alien's claws swung off their perch. They all felt a brief moment of weightlessness– rotating a quarter-turn before the head rush came. It was a forty-foot drop.

Envy broke from the others and oriented himself to land on his feet; the air was punched out of him as he met the ground. Gasping for air, his world was sorely black for a few moments before some form of feeling crept back.

The Doctor was sprawled across the alien, who shook him off as soon as it righted itself. Envy, seeing the Doctor lay prone and limp on the floor, dragged the Doctor back to him with a massive paw. He growled long and low; the others could feel it in their chests. "Worm, there's two ways you can die. One, you tell us what we need to know," he said, advancing on the Rumullitaben, tail writhing, "and you get a quick death after we're finished with this place, or I can take my sweet time turning you into jerky strips in the machine."

The alien backed away, whimpering. "You– you're not a paying customer… I have no contract-"

"I'm a Homunculus, fool. A Sin. We are created from the worst emotions of the species that spawned us. We don't deal in contracts. We deal in ultimatums."

"Envy, stop it!" Elisa cried. She ran over to the Doctor.

"B-but that's not…" the alien stammered.

"Whatever your ideals are, I don't care, worm. Following social norms are only one way to survive." Envy gathered himself up and launched.


	11. Chapter 11

**Chapter 10 True Nature**

Envy grabbed forthe Rumullitaben with both paws unsheathed, but the alien attached its talons onto Envy's limbs. The alien scrabbled all over the Homunculus's body, gouging Envy with its claws. Envy snarled at the pain: even with the flexibility of a cat, he couldn't capture the thing- at least not like this.

"Elisa," Envy's voice was no longer human, "Take the Doctor and go. Don't look back." He then addressed his opponent as he began rippling energy over his body, teeth bared. "I wouldn't show this to someone as low as you normally, but if you killed the Doctor…"

The Rumullitaben screamed as he was wrenched from his perch hanging off Envy's throat. When it hit the floor Envy slammed a hand-like paw on its chest.

"_Somebody!" "I love you." "Mommy, Daddy…" "Help me…" "…at me…" "Don't go…" "You bastard!" "…look at…" "Why? Oh God…" "Thank you." "Don't look… don't look… don't look at… me…"_

"_**Don't. Look. AT. ME! DON'T LOOK AT ME, WORM! DON'T LOOK AT ME!"**_

The alien was petrified. Envy glared at him through his eight pupils and the numerous grasping and gaping bodies that covered his own. Hundreds of human bodies, writhing, weeping, pleading, dying, dying, dying…

"This is my true form… I won't let you live after seeing me… no one will know what I am like…" His lips parted in a sneer, strong white teeth flashed light in the alien's eyes. Through the open maw reached out a tongue swarming with more desperate bodies. Envy wrapped it around the alien as the bodies pulled his victim further into his mouth.

"Stop it! Envy! Don't do it!"

Envy flinched. "Eh?" He turned his great body to face the human. "Elisa… I told you to run. WHY DIDN'T YOU LISTEN?" _'How can she stand he sight of me!'_ He screamed in his head.

"_Stop killing, Envy. _You're going to kill again. You'll never learn to be a better person if you don't try to act like one."

Envy roared and charged until his muzzle was only inches before Elisa, his tongue with its captive hanging out to the side. "DO YOU SEE WHAT I AM? I AM NOTHING IF NOT TO BE REVILED!" She hadn't moved an inch._ 'She's not afraid? Why?' _ Envy's tail coiled and rolled behind him; he was exhaling through his nostrils, blasting hot air onto Elisa, blowing her hair astray.

"You've never tried," she stated simply. The Rumullitaben whimpered, struggling against the malformed bodies.

"_Tried?_" Envy said as if the word was foreign. The seven pupils of his left eye, once so focused on the companion, now scattered at the thought. "What's the point, Human? I was created to be a monster- you're just being a dreaming idiot."

"Where you created to be a Time Lord?"

Envy was speechless. He drew his head back, as if to spurn the idea. "Sh-shut up," he said finally.

Elisa was about to respond when the Doctor groaned and came around. "Envy," he said, "don't eat him- it's not polite." The Doctor pushed himself up.

"Uhh…" Envy lowered his head to the ground, releasing his hold with his tongue but trapped the Rumullitaben in one pair of forelegs. He slowly turned his eyes to the Doctor, who stood before Envy, hands in pockets and weight shifted forward. "You knew this is me?"

"I knew for longer than you've been alive."

Envy drew his head back, jaw agape, and blinked. A shiver ran down him. He felt afraid of the Doctor again. '_The Doctor knew,'_ the Doctor knew, and he still took him in. Envy was supposed to spend his life being the one left behind, and yet– there the Doctor was, patiently waiting for Envy to be ready. The Doctor could have chosen any of his siblings: Lust, or Greed, or even Wraith, but it was he instead– _the It_– that stood before this man who defied the fates and defeated gods. "I don't understand," he whispered, "why?"

"I think you already know the answer, Envy." The Doctor regarded his apprentice with a hopeful look.

Envy froze for a moment before his haunches collapsed, his head bowed and eyes lidded. His hair fell over him like a veil. When Envy regarded the Doctor again, his monstrous face had such a look of relief and thanks that it almost looked human again.

"So, is that what you are, ugly?" the Rumullitaben dared to muse. "Nothing but a bully with an inferiority complex."

There was a moment where all that could be heard was the whirring of distant machines. Envy's usual demeanor returned. "Don't get smart, worm. This is my planet you're trying to kill. And _don't_ call me _that_." Envy finished with a squeeze.

"Alright," the Doctor intervened. "Back on track now. I don't suppose we could get any info from you? Who's hiring? Why? Method of payment? Where they are now?"

"No money, no info."

"How about this then?" Envy said, increasing his grip on the alien. "We can't _pay,_ but we can help _your family save_ on the expenses of your _funeral_ you won't have because you supplied us with what we need to know."

"That's not…"

"Not directly a form of payment, no," Envy said, dragging his slathering tongue across the alien's body. "But this can either be a cost to your loved ones, or an opportunity for… further investment."

"It's… to be a… place to destroy evidence," it offered.

"So it's a mafia or some corrupt organization. Only thing able to finance something like this," the Doctor reasoned. "Anything else?"

"Try… big authority figures."

"Okay, thank you. Let him go, Envy."

Envy looked a little surprised, but obeyed. The alien scuttled away down the corridor, looking awkward running on arms too long and legs too short.

"Well, that gives us a good place to start, let's see what's been on the news lately." They found a control room and routed a few computers to the net. What they found was a number of Amestris officials who had no connections to the area where the LHC was being constructed advocating the project, calling it "a glorious feat of human ingenuity, and the beacon to their mastery of the universe's mysteries." There were also questions raised over the design of the LHC in the scientific community, who were reassured by their colleagues in a manner that sounded suspiciously placating.

"I bet if you jumped off a fifty story building onto them all piled together, you'd land safely, if you don't mind all that squish," Envy commented. He could be very superficial at times.

"Envy, is it really that difficult to not say things that aren't insulting?" Elisa chastised.

Envy gave her a sad face, went over and hugged her. "I like you, you're snuggly-warm."

"Envy-"

"Snuggly-warm."

Elisa sighed.

"_Snuggly,"_ Envy mumbled.

"Well, we struck it lucky anyhoo," the Doctor said, choosing to ignore his companions' exchange. "They're all coming for a tour."

The officials all came in a caravan of vehicles. They came with high hopes and good cheer, complementing the progress being made. The Doctor, Envy and Elisa casually joined the group with the cover of university professor and his interns.

Elisa nudged over to Envy and pointed one woman out. "She seems to be pretty knowledgeable about colliders for a nutritionist," she told Envy in an undertone.

"Well, maybe it's her fall-back career."

"What do you mean?"

"Look at her," Envy said. "She doesn't look like she'd make a stellar nutritionist." Elisa stomped on Envy's foot and ground her heel in. "Ow! I'm just saying-" he complained.

The Doctor gave them a quick glare, telling them to pay attention.

"Well, this looks like it all going well. Let's continue," the woman, Berta Voust said. "Oh, pardon me, I've not been eating as I should," she said in response to her out-gassing.

Envy quirked his eyebrow at Elisa. Elisa elbowed Envy in the side.

"They're all like that: I'm telling you I'm not what's wrong here," Envy muttered as they followed the group.

In time, they all sat down for lunch, giving the trio a chance to get to know the visitors better. Envy used his alias (Evan Holmes), on the assumption that there might still be whispers of his family's failed plot remaining in the government's lore. It had only been ninety years since the Homunculi's fall. He had gotten into conversing with young burly major from Briggs.

"In my opinion, the LHC should have been in the north," Envy said. "It has a bedrock of basalt, so much that it actually increases the gravitational pull of the Earth in that area." He remembered the changes to the tunnel that arose over it- even though Sloth could have dug through it, it would have put them behind schedule. "Good for increasing the masses of particles. It's also another radiation shield."

"Yeah, that's true," the major said. He checked his pocket watch. "Well, better get going."

"Bye, then." Envy chewed on his ham sandwich and considered what he saw. _A State Alchemist…_ that could mean any number of things. He failed to notice Elisa and Voust going together to the ladies' room. He ticked off the possibilities in his head. _'One, he's a traitor; two, that the alien was a competent alchemist; or three, the alien could overtake a State Alchemist.' _None seemed to be preferable. He had no idea how the Doctor would do in a fight with a State Alchemist. Sure, the Doctor was clever, but you also need speed and power to work against them. Elisa would be hopeless. As for himself, he grimaced. He had to keep his identity as a Homunculus hidden as long as possible- once an alchemist knows what to do, well, Envy had his share of experience regarding _that_.

Envy blinked back the sensations that his memory surfaced unexpectedly. His body recoiled from the pain of having his eyes and tongue incinerated. Then there was the time Marcoh destroyed Envy's philosopher's stone. It felt like an electric current ripping his body to pieces. Envy's stomach quivered and the blood drained from his face. He had to get out of there.

Standing up as calmly as he could, he made his way to the drinking fountain*. It was nestled in a nook between the two restrooms. As he drank the barely cold, iron-flavored water, rinsing his aching throat, he became aware of the noise on the other side of the wall. He heard a muffled "_Shit!"_ and he looked up, still pale.

Out of the door scrambled Elisa. A rough spear pierced the door near her shin. Adrenaline rushed, Elisa stomped on the talon, breaking it. What lay on the other side of the door hollered angrily. Elisa snatched up the talon.

"Elisa-" Envy gasped. Her left arm had been gouged with a raggedy, finger-long laceration. They heard the rest of the group hurry to the sound of the din. "Come on!" Envy grabbed right where Elisa's wound was and pulled her out of the side hallway.

They found that only the one disguised as the major had come to face them. "You- you- you're monsters!" Elisa snapped, as she clutched the talon to her chest. Envy turned to see the she-alien emerge from the hallway.

"That's only a matter of perspective, dear," the she-alien said. "You call our business a travesty when you trounce around with that prejudice brat you have there." Standing well over Elisa and Envy, the green monster blinked its glassy eyes in its swollen head.

"Call it a hunch, insect," Envy swaggered, setting one hand on his hip, facing the female alien. "So tell us about yourselves. Are you here to erase the evidence of the crimes you commit, or hide the proof that freaks like you ever existed?"

"You're too brash, boy," the State Alchemist said. He reached up to his forehead, pinched some invisible tab, and began to pull to the side. The path he traced shone forth a blue light, and in the end, another alien emerged. After a bit of a struggle to get itself out of the disguise, the skin fallen to the floor like an empty potato-sack. "Because you're part of the evidence."

*A wholly unnatural name for a bubbler if you ask me. The word "bubbler" in the dictionary, so there.


	12. Chapter 12: Parasite

**Author's Note: Well, summer vacation has come for me and I really should do more than spend time on the internet, but that's easier said than done, as long as the somewhat disappointing weather keeps up. Onto more relevant things, I did some rewrite before publishing this so sorry if some of it seems awkward or comes from out of nowhere. Just drop me a review and I'll see to it! That's why reviews exist- so that authors can improve their work. I don't own DW or FMA, but one day I hope to reach their level of epicness.**

**Chapter 11 Parasite**

The alien that emerged from the alchemist's skin flourished his hands, revealing its palms covered in the insignia of transmutation circles, linked by two lines of rings tattooed across his shoulders and chest. Light crackled around his palms, taking form, and launched around Elisa and Envy, snaring them. The rest of the monster's tattooed rings activated and became tendrils. They were tipped with razors, as Elisa soon learned with a new slice on her cheek.

"Envy!" she yelled. "Envy! Envy?" She turned her head to see Envy lolling in a daze. Energy weakly sparked out of the nodes on his forehead and back. _'Is it that weird alchemy that's weakening him?'_ Elisa wondered. She suddenly felt the slash of the razor tendril across the bridge of her nose, its light blinding.

"Don't get distracted, human," the alien said. Elisa blinked the color away as she turned to the attacker. Behind him, she saw the Doctor at the end of the corridor give a shaken glance their way before turning to face the other aliens.

"You look so ugly- pink and skinny and runty," the alien sneered. "I hope your flesh is more promising."

Elisa flinched and stamped her feet. "Bastard!" she snarled. Behind her, Envy convulsed lethargically.

"What's this?" the female alien asked, her talon dripping with disintegrating gore. "You're healing already, boy? How fascinating."

"Is he?" the other asked. "I wonder…" He lifted the two up, and rotated them so that Envy faced him. "Curious, very curious. I never thought I'd find one…" He traced Envy's nodes with one tentacle. Envy groaned. The alien stabbed one node, and Envy flinched and whimpered, gasped at the pain. "A Homunculus indeed. A where there's a Homunculus, there's a Philosopher's Stone." With another tendril, he tilted Envy's head up. "Aren't I right?" The alien pried open Envy's mouth and thrust one tendril down his throat. Envy gagged and coughed, his eyes bulged and rolled back into his head. The alien smiled. "Oh I do so love it when I am."

"Stop it, you bastard!" Elisa shouted at the alien. She found Envy's inert hand. His skin was cold and clammy. She could just barely feel it shake, and gave it a squeeze. His fingers twitched in response.

"My dear, you really should worry more about yourself," the female said. "After all, this is a prime opportunity; it's been so long since we've got to hunt."

"Mmm, true," the other replied, and he released his hold. Elisa grabbed a hold of the disoriented Envy and steadied him as his head cleared. "Dibs on the Homunculus."

Elisa experienced a moment of frozen terror before she bolted, dragging Envy along. Envy staggered until Elisa gave a hard yank on his arm. "They think we're pray!" she shouted at her friend when he gave a confused "What?"

Envy stared back at the pursuers. Big, green and screechy, they looked like mantises with mumps. _He, Envy,_ was fleeing from some oversized _bugs?_ This was unacceptable. He snapped his wrist from Elias's grip, and in less than a moment, he was charging the insects, roaring in a blind rage, his body growing every second. He smiled to himself inside as the bugs stammered to a halt. The female tried to weave in between his legs, but Envy was sure he felt something crunchy rupture into something gooey as he charged his predator. He defiantly heard a scream of pain.

The scream broke the other alien out of its daze. It stumbled back a few steps, regained its footing and charged Envy, tattoos glowing. It leapt, digging its talons into Envy's muzzle as it activated its alchemy. Light arched from the circle created by alchemist and Homunculus. It turned from bolts to a solid beam streaking straight up.

"Envy! Envy!" Elisa could only stand by and watch as the light disappeared with her friend and the alien. She glanced from the spot where the two vanished to the remaining alien. "Oh God. Oh no. Where are they? What happened?"

"Shut up, little fool," the alien said, gathering herself to her feet. Her left shoulder was oozing profusely and currently armless. "Worry about yourself more." It started to advance.

"Are you insane?" Elisa gasped. "You're missing an arm! And don't say it's just a flesh wound!" It was an ineffective plea. Elisa turned and ran as the alien closed the distance.

Envy kicked and twitched his dragonish body. The alien would not release his hold. Envy soon realized that for all his thrashing he had nothing to brace against. It was _This Place. Again._ The Truth. He snarled at his attacker, "What the hell were you thinking, fool?"

"Fool indeed," a sociopathic voice said.

"What?" the alien boggled. "What is this place? Who are you?"

The Truth took the shape of the alien and leered sadistically. "What _ever_ were you thinking? Trying to absorb a Philosopher's Stone created with a different method than the alchemy you use? My, my. How inefficient. But you did manage to come here, and that isn't a free trip," the Truth's entire figure shimmered. "Oh, and you brought the Homunculus. Wonderful." The Truth's head shimmered some more. "So I'll reward you. If you want some of Envy's power, I grant it to you."

Envy began to shudder in a bone rattling pain. "Wha- what are you doing? Stop it!" He writhed and screamed as the bodies on him became less and less coherent.

Envy was not aware of it, but he alien began shaking himself and gripped his head. "What is this? What are these voices? Why? Be Quiet! Be Quiet!"

The Truth cackled. "What's wrong? I thought you wanted the Homunculus's power. Don't you like hearing all the voices of the sacrificed?"

"Don't… treat… me... like… some… AARGH!" Envy's eight limbs flailed against the emptiness of the Truth.

"Oh, my dear Homunculus," the Truth cooed, "You're really a desperate one. How much do you think you can get for free? You will have to make a sacrifice eventually." With a final dark giggle, the Truth dissipated, sending its victims back to reality.


	13. Chapter 13: Starteling Moments

**Chapter 12 Startling Moments**

Reality burst forth into their presence. Around Envy and the alien the light scattered. They were sprawled in the same place they vanished from. Envy, still in his monstrous form, was belly side up, his clawed feet kicking the air.

A strained cry reached him from down the hall, snapping the Homunculus into alertness. Envy kicked and rolled over, seeing the green monster clattering down the hall after Elisa. He gave an angry snarl, and charged after it. The alien was clearly unaware of what lay behind her because she changed her step to one that would let her pounce when the opening came. Envy bellowed, exchanging his gangly true form for the finer honed liger one he took earlier. Both Elisa and the alien started, and as Elisa jumped mid-step, twisting around out of impulse, the alien faltered, clattering forward into Elisa.

Elisa, in a heightened state of fear, shoved her hands out to block the alien, almost unaware of the giant feline coming up behind it. It must have been luck, or some internal sense of self-preservation, but her hand that held the forgotten talon found itself guided to alien's black, shining eye. It was the unrestrained momentum of the alien that drove the talon inward, and with a sickening crunch, the floor delivered the final blow. Elisa got tripped up in all this, and found herself trapped under the dead mass of the falling alien. The air was knocked out of there as she hit the floor. Even though it felt miles away, Elisa could hear the clicking of claws on the floor and the scraping they made as Envy slid to a stop.

With his massive paw, Envy rolled the dead alien off and away of Elisa. Envy's furry liger face appeared over her, and she gasped, "Envy." She pushed herself up, and Envy pulled her into him. Elisa coughed and buried her face into his mane.

"You did well," Envy simply said.

Soon they turned to the alchemist alien. It lain on the floor like a forgotten ragdoll. "So what do we do with him?" Elisa said, still shaken. Envy stood beside her still in the liger form, letting Elisa bury her fingers in his mane.

"There's nothing he's useful for anymore," Envy answered candidly. "Looks like the Truth took his entire nervous system as payment, and now all he can hear is the souls of the Philosopher's Stone. _Huh._ Serves him right." He spied his knapsack a few yards away, where he must of dropped it in their encounter, nosed the back strap over him and returned to his human form.

"Uh- yeah… let's go," Elisa said, and led the way to the far end of the corridor.

The hallway split into one continuing corridor and a set of stairs. Glancing around, Elisa saw a glint of something on the stairs, and she looked closer. The sonic screwdriver. "They went this way- look," Elisa said abruptly while picking up the device. They heard some sound coming from the floor above them, and they dashed toward it.

Inside the darkened controls room, the Doctor was in a tight spot. Reserve power had kicked in, and the various light of the computers shown dimly on the figures. The Slitheen had him surrounded in a room filled with banks of unusable electronics. What's worse, he lost his sonic. This was bad news. _'You have no idea what you've gotten yourself into,'_ he thought, _'now you're forcing me to be clever.'_ Bad news- for the Slitheen, to be precise. But just how, he didn't know.

Envy and Elisa charged across a catwalk suspended over the simulator, when Envy skidded to a halt and said, "Shit!"

"What?" Elisa turned to him, concern flooding her face.

"The gravity sim," Envy said, pulling his tablet out of his knapsack, "if all else fails, our only hope is to have it malfunction. Here. Trade you."

"Trade? Trade me what?"

"This bag for that screwdriver." Envy started to punch and drag icons on his device, pulling up the schematics.

"Are you kidding?"

"I need the screwdriver to fix the collider; you need to get to the Doctor. Besides, I hate getting into fights."

"You? That's a load of bull. Hey- what have I got for defense?"

"Everything in that bag- Oh, come on now, it's me, what would you expect?" He ripped the screwdriver out of Elisa's hand, leapt over the railing and onto the simulator, then took off running. "Go!" Envy called over his shoulder.

Elisa sighed and slumped, hating that know-it-all attitude of his. But this wasn't the time for that. She loosened the pull cord, not bothering to shoulder the bag, and hoped she never needed to use whatever she might pull out of it.

Envy glanced from schematics to gravity simulator. He was beginning see it now, even as he worked under pressure- how all the components of the machine fit together, what each object's purpose was. The whole design had some sort of eerie beauty; something so delicate could unleash such power, like a transmutation circle. Could this be why alchemists acted like jealous older siblings toward the particle physicists who are now getting all the attention? Jealous? Envy chuckled- for once, it wasn't him. Now that he knew better, he saw how elegant the simulator really was. Let those simple Human alchemists cling to their narrow views. Envy had become a_ Time Lord._

"Oh little booyyy," a gurgling voice called. "Come down, little one, I can smell you up there."

'_Undoubtedly,'_ Envy mused, continuing to fiddle with the machine, _'the Doctor and Elise_ would_ try some sentimental spiel to placate those overgrown bugs. The day that works will be the day I get nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize.'_ He made one final adjustment to the panel and got up, dusting his hands off. He could two other distinct voices conversing with the first one.

"Why, little Human, you looked so young and handsome, let me kiss you with my big, green lips."

'_Is that what you like,"_ Envy purred to himself as his body began to crackle. _'Then I know what will all make us happy.' _Envy leapt off the collider, back arched in a pounce.

_The Slitheen's faces had probably never contorted so much in horror as they had now. Instead of the lean, pale youth they had anticipated, the aliens were gaping at a monster, covered in human bodies, eight ripped and taloned limbs, and an animal's face peeled back in an open mouthed grin that issued a bloodlust laden laugh that not even the fiercest of their kind could match. The beast landed, sending tremors through the floor, except for one of their party, who had stirred too late to avoid the beast's front-most left paw, cracked and splattered underneath it. The spray struck everyone, including the monster, which licked the innards off its muzzle, acting as though it was curious about the taste._

"_Not bad, but it needs more… body," it said, turning to face the remaining Slitheen, a demonic grin plastered on its face._

Envy's opponents were caught in a struggle between two instincts: they were natural hunters in their element, but now a long forgotten function of their endocrine system sparked to life with the competing message to flee. It was almost too amusing to keep face. One of the bugs jumped at Envy's face, gouging out the eye. Snarling at the pain, Envy clawed it off and swiftly crushed the skull. He let it drop admiring how the limp figure bounced when it hit the floor.

That left only one. "Pucker up, sweets. Didn't you want to kiss me?" Padded forward on his second set of front legs, the first tucked up under him, ready to capture. "What's the matter- I thought you thought I was young and handsome?" Rising up off his haunches like an alerted dog, he stalked the alien, a cackle building deep in his throat. The alien's conviction broke.

"Slitheen," the Doctor begged, "you've got to be mad; there's no reason to _create_ a black hole to hide evidence of crimes." He paused, looking perplexed. "Come to think of it, there's no reason to commit crimes. Unless, of course, the law itself is corrupt- but then breaking the law isn't really a real crime, is it?" The Doctor caught the aliens' expression. "But that's not the point. Look- the Earth still has billions of years left in it. Humans have so much potential, so much- _ahead of them _-you _can't _just toss that all away when they've only just begun. Think about it: there was a time once when the Raxacoricofallapatorians were just as the Humans are now." He looked from one advisory to the other and back again. Neither seemed willing to entertain the idea of sympathizing.

Elisa stood on the other side of the door rummaging around in Envy's knapsack. She pulled out a couple of items rubber-banded together. The read the labels on both, and then the instructions written in messy, angular scrawl on a post-it note: _"__DoNoT MIX UNTILL MOMENT S BEFORE USING"._

"Mentos and Coke," Elisa reread the labels of the packages aloud, "What the hell is this supposed to do?"

The Slitheen fled the monster behind her, but felt a stinging crack along her side, and realized that instead of running, she was flying. Then two sudden cracks lashed her on both sides, then squeezed, and began falling. There was a sudden impact and release and alien hit the floor, finding herself trapped beneath the monster's paw. After a few seconds, the pressure released, and she lay still, hoping the monster would stop if she looked dead. It waited for a bit, then poked at the alien, then gave her a good swat. _The Homunculus was playing with the poor thing before he killed it…_

There was a bank of computers in between the Doctor and the taunting Slitheen. That wasn't much. It was, however, the brain of the gravity simulator. If only he had his sonic screwdriver.

The Slitheen pounced. The Doctor ran, grappling at the panel to help push himself along. Giant claws gouged the controls as the Doctor narrowly missed becoming minced meat. He rounded one bank, the Slitheen turning to follow, when the control room door burst open with Elise hurling some large angry container at the Doctor's pursuer.

**kwa**_**-foomph! tsi-**__tsi-tsississ__sssss…_

"Doctor!" Elise shouted over the growling alien.

The control panels sparked, and the Slitheen stopped pacing once it realized that its skin was burning off. It tried to get away slipped in the sugary froth, and falling to the ground, writhed in agony.

The Doctor dashed over to Elisa. "That was Envy's idea, wasn't it?" he asked.

Elisa nodded. "More or less, yeah," she gasped. The Doctor grabbed the knapsack and began to dig around in it.

"He's coming along quite well then," he commented. He pulled something out and held it up. "Ah, here it is, acetone burner, that should fuse the door shut*. Don't tell him I said anything, though. We don't want to encourage him_ too much,_" the Doctor continued as he lit up the burner.

"Not a word," Elisa agreed.

There was her freedom, right in front of her. The facility doors. Extremely battered and bruised, the Slitheen gimped on one fractured leg, the other sporting a torn tendon, supporting herself with her long arms. The monster slowed its pace, as if it intended to drag her suffering out as long as possible. She reached the doors when it charged. She grappled with the door, then read "Pull," and swinging the door open, she stumbled out into… a mass of beefed up vehicles and swarms of humans wearing red borates while brandishing some nasty firearms.

"Torchwood? How-" the Slitheen groaned. She was beaten sore, exhausted, and fell victim to the element of surprise too many times to count. She sighed, shoulders stooped. "Oh, I give up. You don't have to say anything. Just get me away from the thing inside."

It took several hours of mitigation before everything was cleared up between Torchwood and the Doctor and his posse. It turned out that Torchwood had been watching the construction of the LHC for a while, but only decided to move when it picked up the TARDIS's telltale signals in the facility's vicinity.

What Torchwood was more concerned about was the Homunculus, whom was officially listed as dead, being very much alive, and of greater shock, following the Doctor.

"_**raceist! raceist! raceist!"**_ It took both the Doctor and Elisa to clamp Envy's mouth shut, restrain his flailing arms, and glare wrathfully at him until he submitted.

"It can't be helped," the Torchwood captain sighed, staring at the sulking Envy. Envy sat on the ground, back turned to the captain and Doctor, his long hair partially veiling the bareness of the small of his back, lithe and slender. He had his arms draped around his knees, framing his legs muscular smoothness…

"Jack," the Doctor sternly warned. He had gone through all that effort to give his troublesome apprentice safe clearance, explaining the _entire_ situation involving the Homunculi Time Lords, and so the Doctor by no means wanted to reiterate the... _feistiness_ of Envy's personality. It was perfectly evident to him that even if Jack is immortal and far from choosey, any relationship of _that sort_ with the Homunculus is sure to not end well.

"I have absolutely no idea why humans consistently jump into things without any idea what they are getting into," Envy sighed as the Doctor was guiding him through the TARDIS's controls. "They thought there was a possibility that the LHC could make a black hole, and they still went through with it."

"Hey, wouldn't you want to find out how the universe began?" Elisa challenged as she propped herself against a railing.

"It'd be interesting, sure, but still…" Envy watched numbers fly by on a monitor.

"Well, you said yourself that you'd no idea what you were doing when you choose to follow the Paradox and me," the Doctor said, "and here you are."

"Well, that's because the chance was there," Envy flipped a lever when the right number came up.

" 'Because it's there,'" the Doctor said. "Humans need no greater reason than that."

*Acetone is not a toy. Acetone should not be used by people whose answer to any "what if…" question is "Well, let's try it and find out." I heard it from a guy who heard it from a guy who said he saw it happen…


	14. Chapter 14

**Author's note: Welcome to the second bonus chapter of Toxic Toast! I'm late, and sorry about that! I guess I just get sloppy when I don't a normal schedule (classes and stuff). Well, I'm getting an apartment so that means getting a job and that means some sort of schedule! How weird is that? And just so you know, I don't own FMA or Doctor Who.**

**Bonus Chapter: Complicated Gifts**

The predawn light hung in the valley, and had not quite differentiated itself from the shadows. Envy was sure that no one else was awake, but just in case, he took the form of a hyena. The night air was too dry for dew to form, so instead of taking the path, the Homunculus cut across the prairie.

He chuckled to himself as he trotted along: this was the perfect time to remember that he wanted to figure out why the Paradox's office was so out of character with the rest of him. The man was his clan leader, and the patriarch of New Gallifray and the Time Lord Homunculi, _sure_, but there was just something about him that just warranted a little snoop. Sometimes people just have the wrong type of charisma, and the Paradox was one of these poor [*_heh_*] souls.

The Philosopher's spire that was the focal point of the landscape had several uses. One, it was a part of an inside-out transmutation sphere that encompassed New Gallifray; the rest of the universe lay inside the sphere, and since the universe was so full of life, an entire planet of Homunculi could live off of the dying souls they seeped from it. Second, it severed as a complex for anything that tended to sap energy: the propagation of TARDISes, the Vortex, development of chimera species (which were more tolerant of Homunculi than ordinary fauna) and anything related to super-advanced technology. It also acted as a communication hub and a formal meeting area for different clans. Then, there was, of course, the boss's office.

It hadn't changed since he first visited the place, but at the time, he hadn't got any more than a glance and a feeling about the place. Quite frankly, the man displayed no sense of décor in the sparsely furnished office. Off to one side was a solid particle-board bookshelf with plasticwood veneer, and across from it was a print of the Mona Lisa. No, wait- Envy took a closer look- that looked like it was _painted_ on a board and-

He wasn't going to ask. And if anyone asks, he was going to insist that the light refraction was all-wrong and that it had to be photoshopped. The floor was covered with a number of hall rugs, and some small-town diner somewhere was missing it's chrome-plated chair with cracked vinyl cushioning. The only thing (officially) in the room that was worth anything of any real value was the desk and chair set, which was complete with the garish accents like the clawfeet.

Envy walked around slowly, careful not to make too much noise. He scanned the room for any hints, and did so more carefully this time. Coming round the desk, he noticed that his footfall felt a lot hollower than before. Stepping back, Envy cautiously pulled back the rugs to reveal a wooden trapdoor. He snorted to himself, thinking it foolish of the Paradox to put so little effort into hiding his secret.

Pulling the trapdoor open, it lead quite steeply down a set of steps so that Envy had to descend sideways and one at a time. Eventually it came to a landing that opened into an unlit room. He instinctively felt around the wall for a switch, but instead made contact with what had to be an arm.

"Shi- _oomph!_" The arm shot out and snared Envy's; dragging him off balance and spinning him until he was pinned against the wall with his hand twisted up behind his back. He hissed as the impact forced the air out of his lungs.

"Nosey, aren't you?" a voice behind him hummed.

"Umm… isn't it a bit early to get up for work?" Envy asked shakily. He peered at the Paradox from the corner of his eye. The man had a very smug and cocky smile smeared across his face.

"No, this is just a hobby. But now that you mention it, a little _morning exercise_ wouldn't be such a bad idea. Hell, it could a bit _fun._" Envy suddenly felt the wall disappear, only to feel a head rush that ended with his skull meeting a table. As a matter of fact, he felt the entire table bow a little under the weight of his body.

"_Shi-i-i-it…"_ once again, Envy bit off more than he could chew. The Paradox acted like a letch, and _Envy_ just had to find out for sure. "Go fuck yourself, Paradox. You act sketchy, so don't blame me if…" Envy realized that the man might be acting like that on purpose. It was then that he began to struggle in ernest.

"Hey there," the Paradox leaned over Envy, talking in a low voice, "now you did find my secret lair, so I suppose I should reward you."

"_GoddammitParadoxjustletmegoit'snotlikeanyoneelsecan'tfigureitout-"_

Envy's face was accosted with something very soft, warm, and scratchy. "I call 'em Schrödinger Cats, aren't they cute?" The Paradox suddenly released his hold on Envy.

"_What?"_ Envy stood up only to have a mewling kitten shoved into his arms. "A cat?"

"A _quantum locked_ cat. It has a fifty-fifty chance of being alive when you look at it. It wasn't easy, but I finally figured out how to isolate the probability state trait from the Weeping Angels and transmute it into animals." Both of the Paradox's bodies stood before him, each holding a kitten in each hand. Two were limp. He was fawning over all of them.

"Uh- uh- umm…" Envy, who survived a successful attempt at suicide, who in human form sank in anything but mercury, could find nothing to say about the little animal he held. When he looked at it again, he saw that it a white and brown tabby with a mask. It was still in the stage where it was just a palm-sized ball of fluff. And unless he blinked, he guessed it would start to smell a lot worse than kitten-piddle before long. "…Thanks… I- I like cats. They… don't demand much…"

"So you'll keep her?"

"S- sure…" Envy dazedly turned around and climbed up the stairs. Once outside, the sun began to peek over the horizon. He looked up from his new friend and out into the world, blinking. "What the Hell just happened, Kiki?"


	15. Chapter 15: Shock and Awe

**Author's note: Arrg. It seems that my summer procrastination is catching up on me: I'm still trying to figure out how to finish this new arc! I have a general idea of what I want it to be, but it's just a matter of getting there. Also, for those who would like to know, thanks to APH I've been getting into romance- so I might just write such a fic in the near future… Oh yeah… DW and FMA are not mine.**

**Chapter 13: Shock and Awe**

A warm wind blew through Garfiel's automail shop, whisking away the pungent stink of grease and smelted metals. Winry Rockbell removed a small gear from the grinder, and puffed away the loose filaments, and filed it smooth. Finally, with a critical eye, she studied her work.

"Perfect," she declared, then labeled the piece and set it among the rest of the pieces. Winry straightened up and announced, "Mr. Garfiel, I've got the wrist and hand gears finished."

"That's wonderful, dear," chimed the muscled, well-groomed man. "Why don't you take an hour off and get some lunch. You got to work so early, you must be famished."

Winry nodded. "Thanks," she said.

Rush Valley was Winry's home away from home. It was a nested in a dry area of Amestris, but for an automailer like herself, it couldn't be more vibrant. She strode down the busy street, glancing this way and that and identifying the different makes of the bionic limbs as she passed. At last Winry came to a diner stand that sold some of the best roast-beef sandwiches she knew.

Just as she got her plate, there came a humming noise, unnatural in sound and growing in volume. Winry looked up, and saw a huge metal _something_ cruising over the valley, casting a dark shadow on the town below. It turned sharply in the air, hovering eighty feet off the ground. From it, came another noise, this time crackling like static but suffused with a wet, grinding sound that had to be a voice, but if it said anything, she couldn't understand it.

Then, higher up, there soared in two more of the things, answering the first with the same strange voice. Winry sat motionless, in total fear of the things. Other people in the valley gathered beneath the things, chattering in wonder and excitement. Winry would have been among them if she hadn't have gotten caught in the Philosopher's Stone war a few years before- a war that was to remain hidden from the people. She knew how dangerous amazing things could be.

Suddenly, the first hovering thing shot a red beam out from its underside, striking a shop, and turning it into ash and rubble. The voice let out what sounded like a cheer, and the other things wheeled around and started blasting other buildings as well. People screamed and fled, running about in a panic. Winry felt her chest being seized and dragged over the counter.

"Get inside, will ya', girl!" the diner cook cried. She was a big powerful woman, not one to be disobeyed. "Yeh'll get yerself killed out there! Into the back with you." The woman pushed Winry around to the other side of the island, where she crouched down, afraid for her life.

* * *

'_Please, somebody help,' _Winry prayed. _"Save us, we need your help…"_

"_HELP! I need somebody! HELP! Not just anybody! HELP! Oh, won't you please, please-"_

"-turn that thing down? I can't focus," Envy glared at the companion, one had propping his head up on the desk, the other whapping a pen on it in irritation.

"Sorry, what are you trying to do?" Elisa asked the apprentice, hoping to placate Envy before he became unbearably moody.

"Trying to figure out the quantum chromodynamics' equations. It's not easy," he groused. It was the best use of his time at the moment, since the Doctor was giving the TARDIS some TLC.

"Oh, okay," Elisa nodded. Anything quantum was beyond her; it's not easy to explain to the general public. But Envy's concentration had been hopelessly broken- the bottom of the page he'd been writing in was being adorned in… Julius Ceasar Pac-Man in a break-dancing contest with Darth Vader Pac-Man? If Envy could make that work, then he had to have some grasp of what he was supposed to be studying. He was starting to fill out the scene with a bunch of ninja Pak-Mans cannibalizing each other. She let him to his own devices.

"Elisa!" From deep beneath the floor grate, the Doctor called. "Could you get me my psychic paper? Somebody's put a message on it."

She caught herself before asking: "how'd you know that?" when she remembered the "psychic" part. Finding its wallet in the Doctor's coat pocket, she handed it down to him.

"Oh boy…" the Doctor said, examining the paper. "Somebody is really panicking, this is almost unreadable… they're probably don't even know about the paper…" The Doctor hoisted himself up onto the floor. "All done. Envy! We've been called forth!" He turned to the console and stared the TARDIS up. "And awaaay we go!"

She didn't know how long the attack lasted. Winry huddled behind the counter with the woman, who was called Geraldine, on guard with a frying pan and carving knife. When the noise settled, and the dread humming faded, Winry crept out and stared out into the wreckage.

"Why? What did we do? Why did they do that?" Winry muttered in shock.

Geraldine wrapped a strong arm around her shoulder. "It's alright, dear. We'll rebuild. You better get back home."

Winry swallowed, biting her lip, she nodded and left. She walked back slowly, as if there were wild animals lurking behind every pile of debris. Behind her, a repetition of strange whirring sounds cut though her daze, and she dreadfully turned around to face its source. Starting out from nothing, a big blue box appeared, growing more solid with each whirr, as the light atop it shone brighter each second.

Geraldine was stomping right up to the box, wielding her frying pan, ready to fight. The sounds ended and there was moment of silence before the box's door swung open. Whoever it was that stepped out received a face-full of cast iron, complete with a satisfying resounding _**go-o-o-on-on-onn-nn-ng-ng-gg-gg-ggg-ggg**_. The man slammed into the doorframe, slid down, and slumped against dust-covered ground.

"Doctor!" Winry heard a woman's voice cry. Winry's legs were carrying her desperately toward the confrontation. She saw the limp figure being dragged back into the box.

"Treat us like cattle, will yeh?" Grealdine crowed. "This'll show yeh, it will." She raised the pan again, only to step back in terror. Winry stopped dead in her tracks.

From the inside of the box came what could only the bellow of an angry bull. And it was a bull that came charging out at Grealdine, swinging its head and snorting and stamping the dust. Grealdine batted its head, trying to evade those deadly horns. At last she reached a safe distance, and the bull settled and stood guard like a watchdog.

After a few moments of shaky tension, the man came around, groaning. "Yeowch-arrgh. Man, I _do not want_ that to happen again. That was real nasty." Curious, Winry approached the box. The bull turned it gaze to her, as if it was assessing her, then returned to watching the older woman. Winry approached more cautiously than before.

She came to the doorway, and peered in, shocked. What she saw just wasn't possible. The box was too little for its inside. "How- what…?" she asked weakly.

"Ohh, everyone says that," the man said, getting up and dusting himself off. He turned to her with a peculiar look on his face. "Are… you the one that called?"

"Called?" Winry repeated.

"This," the man said. He held out his wallet, open to a piece of paper that had written on it: _"Please, somebody help. We need your help."_

Winry stared dumb. "That's my handwriting," she said.

The man grinned toothily. "Good. We've made it."

"Fine," the lady with the man said. "But what is this place?"

"Rush Valley," said a throaty voice behind Winry. The bull, turned back to the group. As it did, it turned into a human with long, stringy hair and a very unusual sense of fashion. "It's been leveled."

Geraldine raised the frying pan, demanding to know "what in blazes sort of Hell-fiend are you?" She was ignored.

Winry's eyes widened in alarm and fear. "E-Envy!" and she took a step back. Edward mentioned the heartless shape-shifter several times before. "You- you're all supposed to be dead! What are you doing here? Why-"

"My family has nothing to do with this," the Homunculus cut in. "They're all dead. I'm the only one left, so don't get paranoid. And don't expect the military to be able to do something. They'd just become cannon fodder." Both of the people he arrived with were concerning themselves with the damage done to the town.

"More importantly, tell us what happened here," man asked, turning from the remains of a piece of machinery.

Geraldine stepped up again. "So who do you say you people are?"

"I'm the Doctor, Envy here is my apprentice, and Elisa is the companion."

This time Winry became cross. "With _him_ as your apprentice, how can we trust _you_?" she demanded. Envy, not wanting to deal with the awkward situation, joined Elisa in her survey of the wreckage.

"Because I'm the Doctor, and I promise you, we'll fix this." The Doctor's eyes glinted with the determination that Winry thought only Ed possessed.

* * *

"…And I started to go back to the shop just before you came," Winry finished her tale over a fresh roast beef sandwich. Geraldine got her diner up and running again because "at the end of the day, yeh still got to get folk fed." The Doctor sipped from a many times refilled cup of coffee. When he was further asked about his name, replied "Just the Doctor. That's all." Envy and Elisa sat on the other side of the Doctor, listening in over a piece of pie each.

"Why would aliens just… attack this place and leave?" Elisa said. "It doesn't make any sense. Does it?" She directed the question towards Envy.

Envy pouted, fork dangling from his mouth. "Oh, so now I'm the expert on destructive and psychotic behavior?" Everyone fixed their eyes on him, and he relented with a sigh, staring off into the distance. "Ohh… hmm. Could just be simple vandalism. Or they feel threatened? I don't know why though. Maybe they're declaring their territory for some reason?"

"Well…" Elisa mused, "it's not going to be to long bef-_ow!"_

Envy stomped on her foot. "Spoi-il-erss," he gritted to her through his teeth.

"Right, sorry," she muttered.

"You know what I wonder," the Doctor chimed in, "is _if _Rush Valley was the only placed attacked." He drew the sonic screwdriver out and directed toward the diner's radio.

"Yeh'll not going to get anything, Doctor, I've tried." Grealdine said from behind the stove.

"No problem. Envy, why don't you escort Miss Rockbell back to the shop. They're probably worried sick about her." The Doctor completely ignored the look he received from the both of them.

* * *

"This is just where a journalist wants to be," announced as Elisa set out with Winry and Envy, "Right in the middle of things."

"If 'right in the middle of things' is so great," Envy grumbled as he stepped over a fallen cornerstone, "then wouldn't be better if you'd have been here when the attack was going on?"

"Er, well… that's true," Elisa said. "Not that we enjoy seeing terrorists attacks or anything like that, it's just more creditable if the reporter can verify things for themselves. So, Winry, you've actually seen the ships that attacked. What were they like?"

"Oh, um," Winry paused, shaken by her abruptness. "Well, they were kind of shaped like stone arrowheads, but made of some dark metal-but it wasn't a polished finish-"

"Could have been residual soot from entering the atmosphere," Envy cut in. He was crouched near the remains of a wall, eyeballing something about the damage.

"What exactly are you doing?" Winry asked, perplexed about the Homunculus's unusual behavior.

"You know the beam you said the ships attacked with? We thought it was a laser, but that's not it."

Elisa propped her elbows across Envy's shoulders. "Wow, En, you really have been paying attention to the Doctor. You're actually _looking_ at things _and_ figuring things out about them."

Envy snorted. "Aren't you supposed to be weak and useless or something? I'm the one escorting you, so don't get cocky."

Elisa slapped him on the shoulder, careful to avoid his sensitive nodes. "So what have you determined?"

"The center of the damage done in this wall lines up with the centers of those," he said, pointing to the holes blasted into the building's other walls. "_But,_ the edges don't- they get _narrower_ as they go back."

"So that means…?" Winry pried.

Envy turned to face them, putting on an it's-only-obvious face, and crossing his arms. "If it were a laser, the edges would all line up." He then clamored over to the remains, carefully selected a piece of debris, _and licked it_.

"Yep," Envy said, "defiantly super-energized particles. Not lasers." He straightened up, and directly faced Winry. "So anyway, what about the spaceships?"

"Er, well, there were these rows of lights on them, and…" Winry faltered. "If I knew the terms for all the parts, I could describe it better."

"Could you draw the ship?" Elisa cut in. "You said you got a real good look at it." Winry nodded.

* * *

Back at Garfiel's, Winry sat at the drafting table, once Garfiel calmed down. He was just in the middle of describing Winry to the local MP officer when she arrived. "Oh where _were you?_ I was so afraid that you were caught in the attack, but the military told us not to leave the shops. Oh Dear, I am so relieved. And who are these people?" He asked, referring to the other two.

"Elisa Grant, and…" Winry faltered, still uncertain about Envy.

"Evan Holmes," Envy finished, wishing that he had shape-shifted earlier. He'd be in hot water if higher command got word of his existence. The Homunculus also had a good idea about who exactly would be heating the water. There was little to keep him from being targeted by the Military as suspect save the Doctor's fierce reputation. Envy shuffled into the array of machinery and avoided eye contact with the MP when the came around to survey the shop. Further, Envy doubted whether the Military even knew of the Doctor; as far as he knew, Father didn't even know of the Time Lord.

When Winry finished, she rolled up the drawing, and handed it over to Elisa. Envy was slumped against the wall, mulling over all the hints and complications of the case.

"Thanks, we'll have the Doctor look at it," Elisa said. "Come on, Envy. Escort me back."

"Yeah, whatever," he replied when his phone went off. _"I want to li-ive where so-oul meets bo-ody-y, and let…"_ "Yeah? Hey Doctor…. We got a schematic. The MP is out and more are coming in…. I know. Hey, did you find anything?... Okay, hold on." Envy lowered his phone and put it on speaker. "Okay, go."

"Alright," the Doctor's voice said. "Rush Valley has been the only town attacked. I got into the Military frequencies, and there have reports of people with automail prosthetics found killed with the automail missing or completely destroyed."

"Yeah? What's that mean?" Envy asked.

"Think, Envy. What would cause an alien to specifically attack human automailers and users?"

"There's no good reason I can think of," Envy scratched the back of his head, thinking. "But you're right, if it's this narrow of a demographic being attacked, then we can nix the petty vandalism.

"Cyborg's rights," Envy said, snapping his fingers. "They're starting to fight for them."

"Right." The Doctor said. "And when that happens, there's usually a resistance."

"Wait, why would people with automail be denied rights?" Envy and Elisa had not left the shop, and Winry was there to hear it.

"For the same reason any group is degraded," the Doctor answered.

"But that doesn't explain anything."

"No. It doesn't." The Doctor said.

An uncomfortable silence spread over the group. At last Winry broke it. "I hope Ed's alright, I haven't heard anything from him."

"He's still a State Alchemist?" Envy asked in a low tone.

"Yeah, why?"

"Elisa, come on. We're coming, Doctor." Envy grabbed Elisa by the wrist and pulled her out into the street.

"W-wait, where'er you going?" Winry ducked out after them. She then abruptly turned back and called, "Mr. Garfiel!"

"Go ahead, Winry! Edward's your friend and Amestris's hero!" the automailer called back.

"Thanks! So?" Winry prodded, jogging to keep up with the other two. "Where'er you going?"

"Don't know yet," Envy replied.

"Is it more safe to go with you guys, or more dangerous?"

"Both," Envy and Elisa said in union.


	16. Chapter 16: Skin Walker

**Author's Note: You know what it's like to spend the summer without much in the way of inspiration or creativity? Well I do! The worst has been for the one incomplete I **_**should **_**be focusing on, and the shrink's not returning my calls- what a [CENSORED]! But this is the long- awaited next chapter of Toxic Toast, and if you haven't checked it out already, I've started an APH fanfic for all you Nation lovers out there! I claim no ownership of Doctor Who or FMA.**

**Chapter 14: Skin-Walker**

On the way back, Envy morphed into a lean youth in clothes expected of a university student. It would be easier to use techno-jargon with the Doctor without being questioned that way. Along the way, a MP tried to stop the three from passing a roadblock. Envy however, walked forward with a purpose in his step.

"Sir, you can't go beyond- Oh." The MP yielded to what Envy had shown him- his fob watch. Or rather, he held it up inches away from the man's face for a second as he strode past. It was a dangerous move, and he could be charged with falsely passing as a State Alchemist, but really, the fob watch is the signature of a Time Lord as well. If the guard didn't recognize that the inscription on the face was a Time Lord rune, it wasn't Envy's fault. You'd want Time Lords to handle this situation anyway.

"There you are! I was getting worried," the Doctor called, ignoring Envy mutterings about the "idiotic military getting in the way." "Well? What'd you figure out?"

"It was, err… a particle beam?" Elisa turned to Envy for verification as she handed the schematics over to the Doctor. Envy nodded.

"Gooood, good," the Doctor said, donning his glasses. "Peterertian, by the looks of it, this ship. Bit dated, though."

"Peteretian," Envy muttered rolling the name around. "They're only what, ninety light-years away? Defiantly in the neighborhood, then."

"Why's that so important?" Winry asked, leaning against an exposed joist. The Doctor drew in a breath, about to answer, when a resounding boom thundered down the valley.

"They're back!" he shouted instead. "Into the TARDIS!"

Elisa grabbed Winry's wrist, pulling the shaken mechanic. She slammed the door shut as the Doctor was focused on a monitor and searching the frequencies as Envy started up the TARDIS.

"What are you thinking? This wood box can't protect us!" Winry screamed as the TARDIS shook wildly, it's core beating.

"Try using your imagination! Boxes make great forts!" the Doctor cried.

"That, or houses," Elisa added, clinging to a support.

"And don't forget rocket ships," Envy finished on the other side of the console.

"Ah! Here we go!" the Doctor cried. "Attention, Peterertians, you are under violation of section fifteen of the Shadow Proclamation, assault on a class five planet. I therefore order you to leave Earth's space at once."

A laugh like a landslide of pebbles came through the speaker, followed by a voice, "What makes you think you can stop us?"

"What makes you think I can't?" the Doctor's raised his brow, voice like a karate master's stance: not aggressive, but brimming with a horrible calm.

"A little man like you couldn't touch us," the voice came, interrupted by some background noise.

"Then tell me why you're attacking innocent people," the Doctor demanded.

The voice screeched in anger. "You call 'em people? Your lot are the problem, thinking cyborgs are worth shit!"

"Them fightin' words," Envy whispered from the console. One second later the ship shook from a particle blast. "Doctor." Envy gave him a dead stare.

The Doctor returned it, saying, "If they're going to fight, better us than Rush Valley. Go ahead."

Envy rushed out the door, body crackling. They had moved the TARDIS to the top of the valley, so Envy had enough space for this.

It was always an adrenaline rush, taking the shape of a golden eagle, even more so than his true form. But this was the first time Envy really needed to use it in battle. If nothing else, he would be a distraction. Beating his wings, Envy climbed up among the ships, bombing and raking with his talons. He knocked them off course, and flew upwards, drawing one away. Envy evaded the ships fire, weaving, veering, diving, until he was certain that the only thing the pilot was focused on was Envy. Spying on another ship, Envy wheeled sharply and dove, the first ship following. Envy reached out with his talons, and snared the ship. He could not pull it with him; rather was he swung around it, putting the second ship where he was a moment before. That place was right where the first ship was headed.

It was a ball of fire. The force of the explosion nearly knocked Envy out of the sky. Burning debris pummeled his wings and fell to the town below. Envy could barely hear the screams above the explosion's roar.

The ship he held onto took enough of the force that its shell acted somewhat as a shield. Envy's wings were exposed and burning, and in the pain, he couldn't regenerate, but reverted to his human form. The rest of his survival of a two hundred foot fall rested solely in the fact that as a Homunculus, he had a few extra souls he could use for coming back to life. Then there was slight factor that the remains of ship's shell were falling right above him. Oh yes. This was going to hurt.

When his neurons had re-grown properly in his skull, and having come around, Envy was distinctly aware that his right shoulder and arm were waiting for a mass of metal to be removed from where they were supposed to regenerate. It also didn't feel like he had enough energy to return to his true form and push the hull off. Envy would just have to wait for help. A nap seemed like a nice idea at the moment.

That moment ended with a great deal of noise and weight being lifted off his damaged limb. Envy sighed at having to get up despite being pinned, trapped and laying on a pile of rock that was digging into every exposed pressure point. But it was that persistent sunlight that really got him. With his new hand, Envy rubbed his eyes and pushed himself up. Wiping the gunk out of one eye, he looked around him, and saw two figures standing over him, sun behind their backs.

"Doctor…?" Envy began to stand up unsteadily, but was knocked over by a wall of heat and light. _Those flames… _Envy was tackled. A pair of sweaty hands pressed down on his shoulders, and an energy burst bored into his nodes. It felt like he was being torn apart. Envy tried to throw the figure off him, but his body was convulsing on it's own. Along his spine and up into his brain, a firestorm went off. It died down quickly, but his Philosopher's stone didn't activate. Envy knew he was in danger, but his body was sinking into unconsciousness. He couldn't fight it…


	17. Chapter 17: All in the Act

**Author's note: Ack, long time no write. Thank you other fanfic ideas, writer's block with this piece and general depression for throwing me so far off track. Don't worry, dear reader's I haven't forgotten your dedication to Toxic Toast, and I am truly appreciative that you've stuck with me this far. There is more epicness to come in this story, and as always, I'll continue to strive for quality writing. If you want to know what other story has been taking up my time, check out my Axis Powers Hetalia story titled "The Chronicles of the Aftermath." Not that I haven't shamelessly promoted it already. Well, back to the main event, here's the next chapter of "Toxic Toast." I do not own Doctor Who or FMA (or APH).**

**Toxic Toast**

**Chapter 15 All in the Act**

Cold. Flat. Hard. Envy opened his eyes and found them staring at a chalk covered stone floor. He was lying on his side, partially curled up. Head still foggy and limbs still heavy, Envy tried to make sense of things. The node on his shoulder that lay on the ground felt like a cattle prod was lodged in it.

"What the hell is going on?" He croaked.

"You're awake," said a young voice. The voice's owner came around to Envy's field of vision and squatted down to see him. A sandy blonde male with golden eyes. "But I don't understand why you're here. Brother saw you die."

"Alphonse Elric." The Homunculus said weakly, "And in the flesh, but it seems that they forgot your brain." When the boy didn't react, Envy sighed, resettling himself as best he could, and said, "It's a long and unbelievable story."

"Do you think I can't handle it?" Alphonse said, insulted.

"I was abducted by aliens, turned into one of them, and now am in training to save the universe from its greatest evils." Envy smirked; he knew Alphonse to not be the sort to kick somebody in the jaw at the first hint of sarcasm, so Envy was safe even when he was as debilitated as this.

Alphonse stared at Envy, looking doubtful. "I think you're joking."

"Nope. Not at all." Envy stared back, trying to look expressionless.

"You could be killed here."

"Quite." Envy said with a click of the tongue. "In fact, there's nothing stopping you from offing me right now. As you can see, I'm not in the best shape right now, so what _I-I-I'm-m_ wondering is what's with the transmutation circle. What's it do, anyway?"

The boy's eyes widened. "Why- do you want to know?"

Envy rolled on to his belly, pain draining as the node on his shoulder lost contact with the floor. Still, moving took a lot of energy. He pillowed his head on his forearms. "If you're letting me live, then there has to be a good reason. If I were you, I'd kill me the second I'd see me." He felt Elric's hesitation. "But then again, you're not the type to attack unprovoked. And I didn't even get the chance to say anything."

"You said "Doctor." Do you still have something against Doctor Marcoh?"

"That old bat? Puh-_leeze. _But as for that fireball…" Envy's eyes unfocused; he remembered something important. "Mustang. It had to be. There's something on your mind, isn't there?" The boy's lip quivered as he took a step away. _'Okay, how does the Doctor do this?'_ He took a breath and began.

"Alphonse," Envy spoke softly, pushing himself up onto his elbows as the boy turned to him, "You seen what happened at Rush Valley. You've seen those ships attacking the town. There are things out there that you aren't able to understand yet, but I am. You need my help. That's why you didn't kill me, isn't it? Because you knew you needed me." Rising to his knees, Envy kept eye contact until a wave of vertigo overtook him, and breathing heavily, he went limp. Red and grey clouds colored his vision, but he registered that Elric was dragging him out of the transmutation circle. He was set up against a wall and the boy tried shaking Envy until he came around.

Envy batted him away, and risked glancing up at Elric, waiting to hear an explanation. When none came, Envy said, "It's bad, isn't it? You're really trusting me."

"Yeah, it's Colonel Mustang- he's not acting like himself." Alphonse offered up, sitting down beside the Homunculus. "Like an animal's inside him. And things happen around him, sometimes."

"Things? What sort of things?"

"Nothing having to do with him or any alchemy," Alphonse said, twiddling his thumbs, "just weird things; like from dreams." Envy rolled his wrist, asking for more explanation. "Well, sometimes I turn around, and there's someone facing him, or speaking to him, but they weren't there before."

Envy leaned back with a sigh and closed his eyes. He was going to need more than this. "When did it all begin?"

"Two, two and a half months ago? That's when- when Big Brother went... missing."

Envy turned slowly to face Alphonse. "Is that when the automail users began getting attacked?"

The boy gasped. "How did you know?" Envy waved the question away. "That's only been circulated on military-only radio frequencies. N-not that I'm supposed to know, but… Wait, do you think that the change in Mustang and the attacks are connected?"

"Don't ask stupid questions." Alphonse and Envy jumped at the voice, knowing they've been caught. Looming in the doorway was a cold-eyed man in a military uniform. Mustang's face was disturbingly similar to the one he wore the last time he and Envy met. "Cohering with the enemy, Alphonse. What are you up to?"

"Please-" Alphonse stammered, nervous. "We have to save Brother, he could be in danger." He started to rise, but Mustang sparked a fireball that sent Alphonse slamming into the wall- but was there something else Envy felt? It was like a little waver, or an arch of energy tapping into a host. Alphonse crumpled to the floor, wheezing. The boy's clothes were charred and it looked like he took some second-degree burns on the face.

Envy turned from Alphonse to Mustang, startled. Mustang had already crossed the room, stood over Envy, and seized him by the scalp. With a frightening amount of power, Mustang thrown Envy back into the circle. Envy crashed headlong and into his shoulder, feeling his clavicle crunch in on itself as his jaw dislocated.

"_Nngguh…" 'The man definitely isn't himself today.'_ Envy didn't revert to his parasite form, but Philosopher's stone couldn't repair the damage. Mustang stood before him again. _'Was anything about my training supposed to prepare me for this?'_ Envy noted that that was a very Doctor-ish thing to think at the moment.

But that was a good thing. If you're not a good actor, you're not a good shape-shifter. And if you can't get into the mindset of your character, then you can't act. The Doctor's style of confrontation was not Envy's cup of tea, but it had a better record. So, without further ado, he began to multitask.

"Coming back here was pretty stupid of you, Homunculus." There it was again- that little arc of _psychic_ energy, and Envy latched onto it, shoving his pain aside.

Gingerly, Envy managed to pop his jaw back into place. "I'd appreciate it if you didn't call me that. It's a bit rude, if you take my meaning." _{As properly as any self-respecting parasite should, Envy anchored himself deeper into this mind- without being noticed.}_

Mustang squatted down, pulling Envy up by his hair again. "Don't get smart. Why are you here? You're supposed to be dead." _{This was good- the mind was too distracted to notice Envy's probing.}_

"I don't know; you brought me here, whoever-you-are. And I say that because the boy's right. It's not by much, but there's something that's _a bit_ un-Mustang-ingy about you. So- why are you possessing the Colonel?"

"What?" Alphonse almost whispered from where he lay.

"Shut up!" Mustang snarled. "I'll kill you!" _{It was only a moment that Mustang dropped his guard, but that's all Envy needed. And Envy saw.} _


	18. Chapter 18: Waking Dreams

**Author's note: Greetings and salutations from this long absent author! I really need to start watching a couple of my favorite shows again to get inspired, don't I? Of course I do. Oh, and I would like to ask people not to yell themselves hoarse about the throwaway running theme in this chapter. TTFN and as always, me no own FMA n DW.**

**Chapter 16 Waking Dreams**

_{Mustang's exhaustion was palpable, Envy decided, as he took in his surroundings of the alchemist's mind. He stood in a barrel-vaulted tunnel, floor lined with tile_. _**'This is where I died… He's still holding onto that…'**__ Envy cringed. It wasn't going to be easy: saving the man he once tried to kill, who, at the same time, tried to kill him. _

_A gasp of pain reached his ears. He spun around and felt out its source with his mind. Far away, he sensed that there was, in the centre of the dream, the dreamer: Mustang. The young Time Lord approached slowly, keeping to the shadows, all the while trying to sense the man's full state. When Envy saw a glow ahead, he walked even more silently, careful of each bare footfall, and narrowed his eyes to hide any glint that would shine in them. As he got closer, he saw Mustang tied to a stake and the woodpile beneath him blazing. The black smoke winding around Mustang formed into a bucking, emaciated horse, and as it rose, it stirred and took Mustang's form, then wicked into the ceiling. Sensing that the predator was still unaware of him, Envy stepped into the firelight.}_

When breath returned to Al, he moved slowly, examining his burns by fingertip. The explosion blinded him, and his eyes stung. He squeezed them shut and resisted the urge to rub. But he could still hear.

Envy still had a barbed tongue. "A threat! So _that's _why I'm still alive- _you need me for something!_ I mean if you're _really_ intending to kill someone, there's no need to threaten their life, you just go ahead and do it. But no matter, if you do kill me, I'll still regenerate."

For Envy, this was another risky move- he was not yet a full-fledged Time Lord, and only when he became one could he be capable of their regeneration. But a little hinting, a little befuddling the enemy couldn't hurt at this point.

The possessed Mustang stared dumbfounded. "Regenerate? Stupid. You can't. Your stone is almost depleted."

Envy brightened, although he leaned heavily on his one good arm to relieve the otherwise painful and lone support of being held up by his scalp. "The stone? Oh no no no no _no_. Not that sort of regeneration. The type I'm thinking of is a bit more… _unpredictable_." The man continued to stare, uncertain but guarded. "Oh, I wouldn't search Mustang's mind for it- Humans are far too young to have heard of them. But I wouldn't be surprised if the legends reached your planet- if it survived the war."

"Planets? What other types of regeneration? What are you talking about, Envy?" Alphonse cried.

"Shut up! YOU'RE SUPPOSED TO BE COWERING AND BEGGING FOR YOUR LIFE! What are you."

Envy smiled inside. He wanted this sort of situation to creep up since the first time he saw the Doctor do it. In a lively voice, Envy said, "What am I? Well, I could be anything- a man, a woman, an adventurer, a cheater, a la chupacabra. I could be a lie. There are_ so many possibilities!_ You know, I don't think there is _any one_ thing that I could be. There's not one solid truth about me you could find! It could be all an illusion, but it also might not. And that goes for everything else that has-is-could have-and-might exist. Know how I know? Because I see 'em, the possibilities." With a coy smile to bare the edge, Envy softened his voice. "Each and every one, flowing around, like currents of wind."

Mustang repositioned his grip the hair. "Wasting my time won't save you."

"Oh I'm not wasting time. I know _exactly_ what I'm doing with it. It's apart of the job description. Time would be in absolute tatters if it weren't for people like me."

Mustang let Envy go. He stepped backwards, shaking. "No- it can't be- they're all gone… the Time Lords were all destroyed."

"Almost," said a voice behind Mustang. Envy never thought he'd see the Colonel jump so high. To bad he was yanked along by his scalp.

_{Envy stood before Mustang, waiting to be noticed,__** "Mustang, you've been possessed,"**__ he said when the Colonel set eyes on him, glowering._

"_**Homunculus!"**__ Mustang shouted back before coughing from smoke inhalation._

"_**Hello to you too,"**__ Envy said calmly__**. "I see that you've been a bit reined in. Need any help?"**_

"_**Shut up."**_

"_**I'll take that as a 'sniffle, yes pwease.'" **__Envy turned serious.__** "You're growing weaker, that thing is feeding off your conscious. It's making your dreams reality." **__Envy stopped to let Mustang digest this. __**"I don't know what it is, or what its goal is, but every time you fight back, it takes more of your conscious for itself."**_

"_**How can you help if you don't know what it is?"**__ Mustang glared at his old nemesis through the flames._

"_**Because I'm not a part of your dream, but I'm inside it. I'm the link to reality."**_

"_**Don't get so cocky when you're half dead,"**__ a blustery voice came from the wall. __**"Even a Time Lord can die if they are killed fast enough." **__ Smoke seeped back into the tunnel, took on the horse shape. It circled the two, prancing in and out of its horse-form, as if sizing them up, snorting, and turned to bit through Mustang's restraints. __**"You are free, alchemist,"**__ it whispered into Mustang's ear, it's long eyelashes dropped in faux regret. __** "You know the Homunculus for what it is. You know its lies; you know its hate."**__ Its smoky eyes turned hard and its thick lips pulled tight against its teeth in a smirk.__** "Do the honors, I insist."**__ Foggy-eyed, Mustang's mind grew pacified against the apparition. Obedient to the heady power of the incense, Mustang raised his hand. Envy tensed and swallowed; he stared back at the man, lips pursed._

"_**Mustang,"**__ the Doctor's voice came from out of the darkness, bearing a dangerous edge.__** "You kill Envy and the Nightmare takes over your mind completely."**__}_

Mustang's body turned to see a lanky man with wild hair in a pinstripe suit-and-tie, wearing a seriously unhappy expression. Behind him appeared two blond-haired girls, one Mustang recognized as Winry Rockbell. She gasped in horror when she saw Alphonse and ran to his side as the other girl ignored the standoff between the men, hovering over the crumpled heap of Envy.

After the possessor's initial shock, Mustang snapped his fingers. What he hadn't noticed that the man in the suit was carrying a fire extinguisher.

_{There was a jet of white cloud that blasted the explosion out of existence_._**"If I may be so rude to say that you need to damper your apatite, but I do have a problem with you roasting my friends."**__The Doctor strode into the firelight in his casually frightening sort of way, extinguisher swinging lazily in his hand._

_Envy let out a snort of laughter. __** "Nice one, Doctor."**_

_The Doctor nodded in acknowledgment. __**"Thanks."**_

"_**Just because you managed to get inside the Human's dream, 'Doctor',"**__ the Nightmare hissed,__** "doesn't mean you're doing anything more than just mouthing off.'"**_

"_**Ah, but what a mouth it is. See?"**__ The Doctor grinned toothily_. _**"I always floss, of course. And I can roll my tongue- Oh, and fold it!" **__He stuck his tongue out, and did in fact fold it back on itself, like a piece of paper. __** "Very rare trait. You've got to have a little band of muscle that runs down the tongue to do it."**_

_The Nightmare's eyes peeled open in fury, its lips flared out, and revealing strong teeth. The alien screamed its fury, the flexing of the hindquarters propelling it forward. And this time, the Doctor aimed the fire extinguisher right into the horse's face.}_

A pang of pressure hit Envy when his connection with Mustang was broken. It made him spasm, to which Elisa raised Envy into sitting, supporting his back. Mustang seemed to be pulled nearly off his feet by thin air as the phantasmal horse vaporized form his being. When no longer held up by the wicking away of the ethereal beast, he fell and crumpled, laid stunned on the floor, and drenched in sweat. He was only aware of his airless chest and dry, burning eyes.

Above the Colonel, the nebulous horse reared and screamed. Weaving in and out of currents it felt, the nightmare placed its sights on the doctor. The Doctor did nothing as the monster rushed forward, accepting his fate as he drew the horse in on his breathe. From his place on the floor, Envy and Elisa gasped a startled "Doctor!" And the atmosphere suddenly turned to one far worse than any hell could offer.

"How dare you," the Doctor, a quiet rage that made Envy huddle in fear. "If you think I will let you have any consolation prize…" Envy swallowed. "Then, take this."

From nowhere, a jagged glowing orange line stretched across the room.

"What's happening? Colonel? Envy?" Alphonse sat up from the wall as he groped the air with his hands. Envy peered at the boy, and could see that he was trying to scan the room with burnt eyes wide open.

"Stay there! Don't move!" Envy shocked even himself with his command.

The line widened, bright like a furnace, creating a powerful vacuum wind. The Doctor stood silently in front of the rift, glaring furiously as the horse was sucked out of him and into the light. Its scream was something Envy never wanted to hear again. When the horse was completely gone, the Doctor pulled out his sonic screwdriver, sealing the rift.

The man pocketed his gadget, sighed and asked, "Now, is everyone alright?"

"Alphonse's really burned," Winry cried.

"I think I need more Philosopher's stone, Doctor." Envy said with a sigh, leaning into Elisa. His dry eyes begged to be closed.

"I think so too," he replied. The Doctor scooped Envy up, who felt unusually light. "Already out; you really pushed yourself to the limit, didn't you?" he muttered. He turned to the door to get Envy down outside of the transmutation circle.

"Hold it, 'Doctor.'" Mustang had already risen. "That thing is a threat to anyone he sets eyes on. I can't allow him to live. If you resist, you will be considered an Enemy of the State."

The Doctor turned to face Mustang, his face unreadable. "An Enemy of the State is pretty light for me, Colonel. I've faced much worse that what you can imagine, and so will Envy, because somebody has to. Things went so very wrong for my people, and Homunculi are the only beings capable of taking the place of the Time Lords." With that, he left the room, and carried his apprentice into the TARDIS, which stood in the corridor. The Doctor lay Envy down by the base of the console, where his condition could be stabilized in the presence of the TARDIS's powerful soul. "Wriny, bring your friend in here and we'll get him treated," the Doctor called.

"Hold it, Miss Rockb- What is this?" Mustang gawked with his first steps into the ship after Winry steered Alphonse into the blue box.

"Only what it looks like- haven't you ever seen a time ship before?" The Doctor ran over to close the door and then came to Alphonse's side. "Alright-y then, let's have a look." He whipped out his glasses.

"Um, excuse me, but, who are you? And what happened to Colonel Mustang?" Alphonse asked.

"The Doctor."

"Yeah, but, you haven't told us your name. I'm Alphonse Elric, by the way."

"The Doctor. As for the Colonel, a Nightmare is a being of pure psychic energy. Ordinarily they attach themselves to non-sentient beings, and feed off their brainwaves, but this one got greedy."

"How are you going to heal me?" Alphonse asked warily. "If you work with Envy, then you probably use a Philosopher's stone."

"Me? Nahhh. Never bothered with it. It's like I told Envy, alchemy never really caught on with the Time Lords. At least, not by our standards. And _that,_ I can assure you, is one reason why you're standing here today. No, Alphonse, I am going to use…" the Doctor sprung up and dashed across the room, and started rummaging around the ship. "Oh, where is it…"

Meanwhile, the rest were experiencing an awkward silence. Elisa sat down in front of Envy, still guarding him from the suspecting alchemist. And with good reason too: Mustang was regarding the two with a silent glare.

"Don't set my ship on fire," the Doctor called from across the room.

Roy jumped at the command, recovered, and said, "Do you really believe that monster that could eat your soul would be your friend?"

Elisa glanced behind her, smiled and said, "There's this video of actual snake that was given a live hamster for food, only it didn't eat it and they live in the cage together. They became friends. I suppose it's like that."

"Aren't we a hypocrite then, Envy?" Roy's stare shifted to the Homunculus.

Envy stirred in his sleep, and let out a little sigh. It was obvious how safe he felt; he didn't bother fighting the tiredness even with a slighted State Alchemist near by. The Doctor trotted back, throwing a dense wool fire blanket over Envy, clenching a palm-sized moist-towelette packet in his teeth.

"Here you go," the Doctor said, tearing open the packet, "clean the burns with this, and you'll be healed in a few hours. Oh, and the eye-drops." The Doctor spun around, reached over Envy, and started to make adjustments on the console. "We'll just head back to New Gallifray for a minute."

"So long as the Viewer doesn't get a hold of Envy," Elisa said.


	19. Chapter 19: Courtesy

**Author's Note: After good times and bad, I've returned, and have spent much time struggling with inane stuff. Like how to carry on with the next arc/episode. Well isn't that just how it goes. I don't own FMA or DW.**

**Chapter 17 Courtesy **

Once Envy had his stone restored, he decided to play it safe in Mustang's presence and took on a new form: Asbestos Bear. Fuzzy, fire retardant and a health risk in more than one way, Envy wouldn't leave this shape even after the group returned to Rush Valley.

"Where's your girl, Horsey?" Envy stood up on his hind legs, towering over everyone. "I'd've thought she'd show up by now."

"I… don't know…" Roy said, scrunching his face, concerned and trying to remember. He shut his eyes, and tried a deep breath. "No!" he whispered, flinching at what he saw in his head.

Envy turned to the alchemist, picking up bits of the man's thoughts_. {He and Riza were in the office, and she was about to leave him with some paperwork. _'April 24, 1920,'_ he read. Pain struck him hard in the head, and Roy collapsed dizzy. 'Sir?' Riza called as she rushed to his side. He tried to make his voice cry out "RUN!" but in the haze of the monster's body, he was too confused to orient himself. It was the Nightmare that used the intention, but it raised his poised hand, and snapped. Riza was thrown against the wall by the force of the blast. 'What…?' she stammered, her hand searching for the door handle. The clock chimed ten. Roy could feel the Nightmare raise his hand again. "NO!"}_

Envy blinked. _'Intense,'_ he thought, distancing himself from what he witnessed. Roy's memory still held him, and the man was shaking violently. Envy didn't move- the alchemist was not stable right now, and if there was anyone who'd set him off, it was Envy. Hawkeye was probably dead, and Mustang would probably be a fugitive. _'Fuck… I'm actually _caring_ about this bastard. None of this is my problem, and there's no way me helping him is going to improve his lot, but… _curse you, Doctor,_ you're making me_ nice._'_

The Doctor was giving Envy a very specific glare, the type that says 'I know what you're thinking, and tough luck. You know what you're supposed to do.'

Envy peered back with his beady bear eyes, wearing an expression that said, 'But, but, what about my safety?'

"I'll handle him," the Doctor said aloud. "Go."

Envy sighed, and lumbered into the TARDIS, and returned to his human form, flipping, levering and toggling his way back to the moment of Roy's possession.

Riza dropped to the floor just as the fireball lit up. Curled up in a fetal position, the force of the blast ground her against the door. The skin on her arms and legs was melting off. The fire's roar drowned out all else. She didn't hear the screeching from the other side of the door, she didn't hear glass shattering. The intensity of the fire vanished, and she collapsed, the pain consuming her. Riza, with blurry eyesight, barely registered that the office door opened, but when a figure she knew from somewhere stood over her, something told her that she was in trouble. She was losing consciousness fast, and couldn't make out what the banded figure was saying.

Riza woke up in what she could only think could be a hospital, although the only thing she recognized was the bed. To her shock, her nurses were cat-human chimeras wearing- of all things- nuns' robes. Using a small box they called a Translator, the cat-chimeras informed her that she was in the year five billion, that everything would be sorted out to within reason so don't worry, and that she was brought here by someone who called himself 'the Doctor's Apprentice,' who's left a note at the office about where you are and that you'll come back when you're healed.

It was two months later that Riza was released from the hospital. She was taken to the lobby (after getting drenched in sanitizer), and stood baffled, wondering who was the person who brought her here.

"RIZA!" Loud and obnoxious, the voice made her jump, and Riza could only think of a few people how could be that annoying. She turned to the face the voice's owner, and nearly had a heart attack. Who it was should have been dead, nor was she used to enemies giving her bear hugs while spinning her around. "Feeling better?" Envy acted like they were long-time friends. Instinctively, Riza reached for her gun, only to remember that as a patient, she would not have one on her. Envy set her down and turned to the door. "Well? Are you coming or not? Or did you have a falling out with Mustang?"

"Why should I trust you?"

Envy spun around wearing a furrowed brow and a small frown. "Why, I brought you here, and I want to get back too- we're missing out on all the fun."

The Doctor managed to draw Mustang into rapt conversation by the time the TARDIS returned. The door opened and Riza stepped out. "Is this- Colonel!" She tore out of the box and ran to Mustang. Envy appeared after her, strolling like the Doctor when his companion was about to step out into some famous when in history.

Elisa looked back at Envy, and noted his tense, pursed expression, and tapped the Doctor to get his attention. "Envy, is something wrong?"

Envy blinked at the reunited friends and turned to her and the Doctor. "No one but the Peterertians were found in the ships?"

"No, why?"

Envy swallowed stiffly, glanced nervously about, and said, "Because I went over the recording of your chat with the E.T.s. That noise in the background?- _THAT _was Fullmetal."

Envy rocked on the balls of his feet, mouth set in a thin straight line as his eyes darted about the scene. Still, he was doing a good job of hiding his fear returning to Amestris, but knowing the Homunculus, the Doctor withheld open reassurance even if he could sense the other's tension. If he had killed Edward Elric, even accidentally… "Let's hope he's in the ship that got away, then."

He could see Roy's eyes widen when Riza told him the news and summon up the energy to search for his young friend from somewhere inside all that exhaustion. That was the strange thing about Humans that Envy secretly admired- even with all resources drained, they seem to defy the laws of thermodynamics when motivated enough- if only the Philosopher's Stone worked the same way.

"We need to find that ship," Roy's voice became strong. "_You, Homunculus._" Envy perked up, tilted his head and pointed his index at himself in a _'who, me?'_ gesture. "Yes, you- you started this mess, so you're going to take responsibility of it, or-" Roy pinched his fingers at Envy in a way that only the Flame Alchemist could make threatening, "- there'll be a repeat of _last time._"

'_Technically, it wasn't me- _I'm _not raciest against cyborgs… at least… not in particular,'_ he left his thought unsaid. Instead he said, "I don't think cyborg should even be considered a race anyway," to himself.

"Oh, they'll get there own sport's leagues in a little bit, just you wait," the Doctor chimed. "Personally, I've always rooted for the Hardscrabble Thespians myself. Lacrosse really took off in the galaxy in the 22nd century." He led the lot back into the TARDIS

"Liverpool Counterweights, if you ask me," Envy said with a smirk.

Elisa hung back until the other three humans caught up. Al had the expression of a confused spaniel. "Did they just switch topics on a whim, or something?"

"That's normal, don't worry," Elisa reassured them. "Those two have so many thoughts going on in their heads all at once that some of them are going to match up. You get the hang of it, though."


End file.
